Soil microbial activity and litter turnover in native grazed and ungrazed rangelands in a semiarid ecosystem

Raiesi, Fayez; Asadi, E.

doi:10.1007/s00374-005-0066-1

Cited by 84 publications

(44 citation statements)

References 37 publications

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“…Despite higher soil moisture in the exclosure, grazing removal had no impact on total SOC content (Table 6), perhaps due to the counteracting effects of increased aboveground inputs and increased microbial activity in the moister exclosure soils (Kieft 1994;Williams et al 2000;Shrestha & Stahl 2008). In support of this hypothesis, removal of grazing increased MBC (Table 5), similar to patterns found in other locations (Raiesi & Asadi 2006;Shrestha & Stahl 2008). Additionally, the results of this study show that the fraction of SOC made up of microbial biomass (MBC/SOC) was higher in the exclosure, suggesting that grazing removal altered the quality of organic matter (Sparling 1992;Kieft 1994;Shrestha & Stahl 2008), possibly leading to increased SOM decomposition.…”

Section: Grassland Restoration Following Grazer Removalsupporting

confidence: 66%

“…Su et al (2005) Effects of grazer exclusion on soil C pools and distribution Soil water content is fundamental to dry land ecosystem functioning because it not only drives plant productivity but also regulates biogeochemical processes in soils (Williams et al 2000;Stavi et al 2008). Among other factors, soil microbes regulate SOM decomposition and thus influence the accumulation of SOC (Raiesi & Asadi 2006). In dry lands, enhanced soil moisture could increase microbial activity, which could accelerate the decomposition of SOM (Li et al 2004;Stavi et al 2008).…”

Section: Grassland Restoration Following Grazer Removalmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Grazing is the predominant land use in dry land ecosystems (Lal 2004), and overgrazing leads to desertification by reducing organic matter inputs to soil and decreasing vegetative cover, resulting in erosion-vulnerable soil with poor water-holding capacity and low fertility and microbial activity (Conant & Paustian 2002;Su et al 2005;Raiesi & Asadi 2006;Zou et al 2007;Steffens et al 2008). Conversely, reducing grazing frequency or intensity leads to vegetation recovery and restoration of soil fertility (Abril & Bucher 1999;Lal 2004;Su et al 2004Su et al , 2005Pei et al 2008).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Grazing exclusion alters ecosystem carbon pools in Alxa desert steppe

Niu

Hall

et al. 2011

New Zealand Journal of Agricultural Research

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The Alxa desert steppe has been strongly degraded by overgrazing, contributing c. 22% of the total springtime dust originating from Asia. Previous work in this region has focused on the impacts of grazer exclusion on restoration of vegetation and soil fertility, yet carbon dynamics are not well known. The effects of 7 years of grazer exclusion on carbon dynamics were studied and related to changes in vegetation and soil properties. Removal of grazing resulted in a significantly greater plant cover and aboveground plant biomass compared with areas that had been subject to grazing, but this had no effects on belowground plant biomass. Removal of grazing resulted in significantly decreased soil bulk density in the 0Á10 cm layer, increased soil water content (7% cf. 40%) and greater soil microbial biomass C (6% cf. 73%) compared with soils in the grazed area. Soil organic carbon (SOC) pools were lower and soil inorganic carbon (SIC) pools were higher in areas that were excluded from grazing. After 7 years of grazer exclusion, the total C pool in the plantÁsoil system was 10% greater (primarily due to 21% greater in SIC) than that in the area that had been grazed over that time period.

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Section: Grassland Restoration Following Grazer Removalsupporting

confidence: 66%

Section: Grassland Restoration Following Grazer Removalmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Grazing exclusion alters ecosystem carbon pools in Alxa desert steppe

Niu

Hall

et al. 2011

New Zealand Journal of Agricultural Research

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“…Soil carbon recovery with improved grassland management in degraded land typically lagged behind plant production recovery and would take a long time (Burke et al, 1995;Werth et al, 2005;Raiesi and Asadi, 2006). In this study, we found that the annual soil carbon sequestration rates showed a hyperbolic decay over time in both alpine meadow and temperate steppe.…”

Section: Factors Influencing the Effects Of Grazing Exclusion On Carbmentioning

confidence: 62%

Effects of grazing exclusion on carbon sequestration and plant diversity in grasslands of China—A meta-analysis

Xiong

Shi

Zhang

et al. 2016

Ecological Engineering

163

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a b s t r a c tWidespread land degradation has strengthened the urgent need to restore overgrazing grasslands. China has implemented the program 'Returning Grazing Land to Grassland' (RGLG) through grazing exclusion by fence since 2003. Despite a lot of field experiments, there is still controversy on the effects of grazing exclusion on rangeland restoration, highlighting the need for synthetic analysis. We conducted a metaanalysis of 447 entries from 78 papers to analyze the spatiotemporal effects of grazing exclusion on plant diversity, productivity and soil carbon sequestration in the major RGLG-implemented provinces of China. Our results showed that, compared with the grazed sites, grazing exclusion significantly increased carbon stored in aboveground biomass, litter mass, belowground biomass and soils by 84.7%, 111.6%, 25.5% and 14.4%, respectively. Plant coverage, soil available nitrogen, soil available phosphorus and soil microbial biomass carbon increased by 52.0%, 21.7% 22.8% and 26.3%, respectively. However, grazing exclusion had little effects on recovering plant diversity in China's grasslands. Of the factors examined, climatic factors strongly modified the effects of grazing exclusion on ecosystem carbon stocks, for example, precipitation significantly amplified the positive effects. Grazing exclusion played a positive role in soil carbon sequestration in most grassland types except in temperate desert-steppe. But annual soil carbon sequestration rates decayed rapidly over time in both alpine meadow and temperate steppe. Short-term (≤5 years) grazing exclusion remarkably increased species richness, but not significantly in the long run. The threshold from neutral to negative effects of grazing exclusion on species evenness occurs after approximately ten years. Our findings provide evidence that grazing exclusion is an effective way to restore vegetation and sequestrate carbon in degraded grasslands, but not beneficial to plant diversity maintenance. The benefits of grazing exclusion are more effective in humid area than arid area. We suggest that grazing exclusion should be ceased after about six to ten years. Additionally, grazing exclusion should integrate with other appropriate management practices instead of operating on a stand-alone basis.

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“…Thus, soil microbial communities play a critical role in ecosystem processes, such as carbon cycling, nutrient turnover, production of trace gases, or pollutant degradation [1]. Microbial activities, populations, and communities are governed by environmental variables, such as soil type and texture, temperature, moisture, or pH, and management practices such as cropping, fertilization, and type of ecosystem also affect soil microbial activities [19,5,6]. Nevertheless, scientists published many papers about the monitoring and impact of soil properties on the biological parameters of soil types in many regions of the world [20,17,12], but the soils the Slovak Republic have rarely been studied.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Characteristics of microbial biomass carbon and respiration activities in arable soil and pasture grassland soil

Maková¹,

Javoreková²,

Medo³

et al. 2011

j. cent. eur. agric.

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The aim of our work was to survey and state the representative values and range of the microbial biomass carbon (C mic ) and microbial respiration activities in arable soils of three types (Chernozem, Luvisol, Planosol) and in pasture grassland soil (Cambisol). In arable soils no significant differences between the soil types were found concerning the content of C mic . Way of soil use significantly influenced C mic with higher values on pasture grassland soil. In Cambisol, a relatively strong relationships between C mic and C org (r = 0.919) as well as between C mic and N tot (r = 0.922) were determined. The basal respiration (BR) was no affected neither by a soil type nor by a way of soil use. On all monitored sites microbes responded positively to the addition of glucose (potential respiration -PR), but the strongest response was observed on the soil types with good mineralisation ability, such as Chernozems and Luvisols. On pasture grassland soil, the substrate availability index (PR/BR) with values of 2.32 was observed, which is lower compared to 7.60 of arable soil. This fact to indicate that pasture grassland soil had more easy decomposable organic compounds than arable soils.Keywords: arable soil; pasture grassland soil; microbial biomass carbon; respiration. AbstraktCieľom našej práce bolo preskúmať a stanoviť reprezentatívne hodnoty a rozsah hodnôt uhlíka mikrobiálnej biomasy (C mic ) a respiračnej aktivity ornej pôdy troch pôdnych typov (černozem, hnedozem, pseudoglej) a pôdy pasienka (kambizem). V ornej pôde neboli zistené preukazné rozdiely v obsahu C mic medzi pôdnymi typmi. Spôsob využívania pôdy preukazne ovplyvnil C mic , s vyššími hodnotami pri pasienku. V kambizemi boli zistené relatívne silné vzťahy medzi C mic a C org (r = 0,919) a C mic a N tot (r = 0,922). Bazálna respirácia (BR) nebola ovplyvnená pôdnym typom ani spôsobom využívania pôdy. Na všetkých sledovaných stanovištiach mikroorganizmy pozitívne reagovali na prídavok glukózy (potenciálna respirácia -PR), ale najsilnejšia odpoveď bola pri pôdnych typoch s dobrou mineralizačnou aktivitou ako černozem DETAILNÝ ABSTRAKTUvedenou štúdiou sme zmonitorovali veľkosť uhlíka mikrobiálnej biomasy a respiračnú aktivitu v štyroch najrozšírenejších pôdnych typoch Slovenska využívaných ako orná pôda a pasienok. Medzi pôdnymi typmi hnedozem (8 lokalít), černozem (7 lokalít) a pseudoglej (6 lokalít) na ornej pôde sme v množstve uhlíka biomasy mikroorganizmov nezistili preukazné rozdiely (pseudoglej od 107 do 777, s priemernou hodnotou 456 µg C g -1 ; černozem od 146 do 802 s priemernou hodnotou 362 µg C g -1 ; hnedozem od 108 do 714 s priemernou hodnotou 257 µg C g -1 ). Avšak pri tomto type využívania pôdy bolo štatisticky preukazne nižšie zastúpenie uhlíka biomasy mikroorganizmov ako v pôde pasienka (kambizem od 1024 do 1592 s priemernou hodnotou 1294 µg C g -1 ). Bazálna respirácia (BR) nebola ovplyvnená pôdnym typom ani spôsobom využívania pôdy. Na prídavok glukózy (potenciálna respirácia PR) pozitívne reagovali mikroorganizmy zo všetkýc...

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Soil microbial activity and litter turnover in native grazed and ungrazed rangelands in a semiarid ecosystem

Cited by 84 publications

References 37 publications

Grazing exclusion alters ecosystem carbon pools in Alxa desert steppe

Grazing exclusion alters ecosystem carbon pools in Alxa desert steppe

Effects of grazing exclusion on carbon sequestration and plant diversity in grasslands of China—A meta-analysis

Characteristics of microbial biomass carbon and respiration activities in arable soil and pasture grassland soil

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