Variations in Soil Microbial Biomass Carbon and Soil Dissolved Organic Carbon in the Re-Vegetation of Hilly Slopes with Purple Soil

Abstract

Crust restoration is increasingly being done but we lack quantitative information on soil improvements. The study aimed to elucidate the dynamics involving soil microbial biomass carbon and soil dissolved organic carbon in the re-vegetation chronosequences of a hillslope land with purple soil in Hengyang, Hunan Province. The soil can cause serious disasters with both soil erosion and seasonal drought, and also becomes a typical representative of ecological disaster area in South China. Using the space-for-time method, we selected six typical sampling plots, designated as follows: grassplot community, meadow thicket community, frutex community, frutex and arbor community, arbor community, and top-level vegetation community. These plots were established to analyze the changes in soil microbial biomass carbon, soil microbial quotien, dissolved organic carbon, dissolved organic carbon/soil organic carbon, and soil basal respiration in 0–10, 10–20, and 20–40 cm soil layers. The relationships of these parameters with soils physic-chemical properties were also determined. The ecological environment of the 6 plant communities is similar and typical; they denoted six different successive stages of restoration on hillslopes with purple soils in Hengyang, Hunan Province. The soil microbial biomass carbon and soil basal respiration contents decreased with increasing soil depth but increased with re-vegetation. By contrast, soil microbial quotient increased with increasing soil depth and re-vegetation. From 0–10 cm soil layer to 20–40 cm soil layer, the dissolved organic carbon content decreased in different re-vegetation stages. In the process of re-vegetation, the dissolved organic carbon content increased in the 0–10 and 10–20 cm soil layers, whereas the dissolved organic carbon content decreased after an initial increase in the 20–40 cm soil layers. Meanwhile, dissolved organic carbon/soil organic carbon increased with increasing soil depth but decreased with re-vegetation. Significant correlations existed among soil microbial biomass carbon, soil microbial quotient, dissolved organic carbon, soil basal respiration and soil physic-chemical properties associated with soil fertility. The results showed that re-vegetation was conducive to the soil quality improvement and the accumulation of soil organic carbon pool of the hillslope land with purple soil in Hengyang, Hunan Province.

The effect of landslide on soil organic carbon stock and biochemical properties of soil

“…Enzymatic activity responds relatively quickly to changes in soil conditions and can reflect the changes in soil quality before they can be detected by other soil analyses (Jin et al 2009;Klamerus-Iwan et al 2015). Soil microbial biomass carbon is usually used to characterise the activity of soil organic carbon (Yang et al 2016). Our study demonstrated that soil microbial biomass carbon increased with restoration of landslide soils.…”

Responses of plant species diversity and soil physical-chemical-microbial properties to Phragmites australis invasion along a density gradient

“…The findings are well justified with the results of Yang et al . 40 through confirmation of positive soil microbial biomass carbon correlation with soil organic carbon.…”

“…The significant changes in microbial biomass and DHA were clearly associated with the different degrees of Phragmites density. The lower microbial biomass and DHA in the soil beneath the low degree density around patches of Phragmites may be caused by the absence of carbon inputs 37 , 40 . From the present study, again, we found variations of AM spore abundance and inoculum potential in soil colonised by Phragmites , which is aligned with the study of Sanon et al .…”

Peer Review #1 of "Greenhouse gas emissions from riparian zone cropland in a tributary bay of the Three Gorges Reservoir, China (v0.2)"

“…PH was measured after shaking with water for 30min (Ye et al, 2017); Soil organic matter was measured by LOI550 (Zhou et al 2014); Soil GWC was determined using the drying method (105 °C for 12h), and bulk density was determined in the gravimetric method (Avnimelech et al, 2001). Dissolved organic carbon was measured through colorimetric analysis (Yang N et al, 2016).…”