**2. Material and Methods**

#### *2.1. Study Site*

This study focuses on a 2.3 ha semi-natural meadow in the Osnabrück district, Lower Saxony, Germany (52.18°N, 8.10°E), as visible in Figure 1. According to the official soil survey map [37], the soil is predominantly gley, with part of the northern area being plaggic anthrosol. The climate is temperate oceanic, with an annual precipitation of 835 mm and a mean air temperature of 8.8 °C [38].

This survey covers the first growth (*G*1) of plants from the beginning of May 2021 until the first mowing in the middle of June 2021, and the second growth (*G*2) until the second mowing at the end of August 2021. The SNG can be assigned to the class *Molino-Arrhenatheretea* and the order *Arrhenatheretalia* [2]. Over the past 5 years, the study site was used twice a year for hay production according to the agri-environmental measure for low-intensity use of grasslands in Lower Saxony GL11 [6]. Before that, it had been used as a cattle pasture for about 30 years and a heterogeneous structure of plant communities had developed.

**Figure 1.** Location of the study site in Germany (**top left**) and the district of Osnabrück (**bottom left**). Orthomosaic and grassland vegetation of one plot of 06/08/2021 (**right**).
