Cultural ecosystem services (CESs) represent a critical link between ecosystems and human well-being and constitute a core foundation for regional sustainable development. The balance between CES supply and demand directly affects the coordination efficiency between ecological conservation and socio-economic development, making it a key prerequisite for ecosystem management, conservation planning, and policy formulation. This study focuses on the circum-Taihu region and integrates multi-source data to assess public perceived demand and spatial supply capacity of CESs. Supply–demand matching relationships are examined across three dimensions, namely, scenic beauty, cultural heritage, and recreation, through the construction of a region-specific CES quantitative indicator system. The impacts of multiple environmental factors on CES supply–demand dynamics are further explored to provide scientific support for coordinated ecological, cultural, and economic sustainability at the regional scale. The findings demonstrate the following: (1) the proposed methodology effectively quantifies CES perception and supply capacity in the circum-Taihu region. Scenic beauty exhibits the highest perception levels, whereas cultural heritage and recreation show lower perception. Cultural heritage displays the strongest supply capacity, whereas scenic beauty and recreation exhibit weaker supply. (2) Significant spatial imbalances exist between CES perception levels and supply capacity across the circum-Taihu region. Areas exhibiting mismatches constitute the largest proportion for cultural heritage CESs, followed by scenic beauty, with recreation displaying the smallest amounts of imbalance. (3) Environmental drivers exert differentiated effects on CES supply–demand relationships. Slope, road network density, and elevation have significant positive effects, whereas the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), distance to water bodies, and distance to roads exhibit significant negative effects. Distance to roads imposes the strongest inhibitory influence on CES perception, whereas elevation emerges as the most influential driver of public perceived CES levels.

Investigating the adaptive mechanisms of different plant growth forms to flooding gradients is essential for formulating scientific vegetation allocation models to support ecological restoration in aquatic–terrestrial ecotones and mitigate ecological risks associated with summer flooding. This study focused on 38 adaptable species under three flooding gradients in the Taihu Lake aquatic–terrestrial ecotone. We systematically measured leaf morphological traits, photosynthetic physiological parameters, and stoichiometric characteristics. Employing analysis of variance, correlation networks, and principal component analysis, we elucidated how flooding environments shape leaf functional trait patterns of woody and herbaceous plants. The results indicated the following. (1) With increasing flooding stress, herbaceous plants increase the leaf area (LA) and leaf dry weight (LDW), whereas woody plants decrease them, indicating that herbaceous plants demonstrate stronger adaptability than woody plants. (2) Woody plants constructed a leaf functional trait network centered on stomatal conductance (G_s), adopting a conservative resource-use strategy. In contrast, herbaceous plants formed a network centered on leaf nitrogen content (N_mass), employing a rapid resource acquisition strategy to adapt to the ecotone environment. (3) The synergistic changes in leaf traits of different growth forms were affected by flooding in distinct ways. Integrating the leaf economics spectrum and adaptive evaluation values for each species can further our understanding of plant adaptation strategies in different flooding environments and guide species selection and configuration for aquatic–terrestrial ecotone restoration.

Understanding intraspecific variation in leaf functional traits is essential for revealing plant resource-use strategies and adaptive mechanisms. Suzhou te