A study was conducted with Poa crymophila, a common grass of alpine meadows of the eastern Tibetan Plateau, to examine the effects of fertilization and clipping on compensatory growth. A factorial field experiment was conducted with seventy-eight 1.3×0.8 m plots subjected to 24 treatment combinations (2 fertilization×2 first clipping time×3 clipping frequency×2 clipping intensity), with one unclipping control treatment. Our results showed that fertilization tended to promote growth of Poa crymophila only in the absence of clipping. Clipping led to increased aboveground biomass and over-compensation in the absence of fertilization，but the degree of compensation depended on intensity, frequency and time of clipping. It may be that a poor resource supply is necessary for over-compensatory growth to occur. We considered two mechanisms as explanations for over-compensatory growth of Poa crymophila: the consumption of underground resources and an increase in the numbers of tillers.