Forest management practices of Pinus tabulaeformis plantations alter soil organic carbon stability by adjusting microbial characteristics on the Loess Plateau of China

Yahui Song; Jiaying Zhai; Jiaoyang Zhang; Leilei Qiao; Guoliang Wang; Lihui Ma; Sha Xue

doi:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.144209

Forest management practices of Pinus tabulaeformis plantations alter soil organic carbon stability by adjusting microbial characteristics on the Loess Plateau of China

Sci Total Environ. 2021 Apr 20:766:144209. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.144209. Epub 2020 Dec 25.

Authors

Yahui Song¹, Jiaying Zhai², Jiaoyang Zhang², Leilei Qiao³, Guoliang Wang³, Lihui Ma⁴, Sha Xue³

Affiliations

¹ State Key Laboratory of Soil Erosion and Dryland Farming on the Loess Plateau, Institute of Soil and Water Conservation, Chinese Academy of Sciences and Ministry of Water Resources, Yangling, Shaanxi 712100, PR China; College of Forestry, Northwest A&F University, Yangling, Shaanxi 712100, PR China.
² State Key Laboratory of Soil Erosion and Dryland Farming on the Loess Plateau, Institute of Soil and Water Conservation, Chinese Academy of Sciences and Ministry of Water Resources, Yangling, Shaanxi 712100, PR China; University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, PR China.
³ Institute of Soil and Water Conservation, Northwest A & F University, Yangling, Shaanxi 712100, PR China; State Key Laboratory of Soil Erosion and Dryland Farming on the Loess Plateau, Institute of Soil and Water Conservation, Chinese Academy of Sciences and Ministry of Water Resources, Yangling, Shaanxi 712100, PR China.
⁴ Institute of Water Saving Agriculture in Arid Areas of China, Northwest A&F University, Yangling, Shaanxi 712100, PR China; Institute of Soil and Water Conservation, Northwest A & F University, Yangling, Shaanxi 712100, PR China. Electronic address: gjzmlh@126.com.

PMID: 33418253
DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.144209

Abstract

Sustainable management practices can enhance the capacity and potential for soil carbon (C) sequestration, significantly contributing towards mitigating regional climate change. Here, we investigated how the microbial characteristics of a Pinus tabulaeformis plantation responded to different management practices to identify the role of microbial characteristics in influencing the stability of soil organic carbon (SOC). We chose a Pinus tabulaeformis plantation on the Loess Plateau where forest management practices had been conducted since 1999. Five forest management practices were implemented: two at the forest level (P. tabulaeformis with and without ground litter), and three using different vegetation restoration approaches after clear-cutting (P. tabulaeformis seedlings, abandoned grassland, and natural shrub regeneration). Microbial biomass, soil respiration, microbial community structure, microbial metabolic function, and soil oxidizable organic carbon (OC) fractions were evaluated. Forest management practices changed SOC stability by adjusting the microbial characteristics (e.g. soil microbial community diversity and microbial metabolic function diversity). The result of path analysis was that the direct path coefficient of microbial biomass on soil oxidizable OC fractions was the largest, which was 1.499. Path analysis and redundancy analysis showed that microbial biomass had the largest direct influence on soil oxidizable OC fractions. Compared with other forest management practices, natural shrub regeneration increased the nonlabile carbon fraction by increasing soil microbial characteristics, and contributed the most towards stabilizing SOC, which enhanced the stability of the soil ecosystem on the plateau. In conclusion, microbial biomass was the biggest influence factor of SOC stability. In contrast, the stability of SOC may be most stable in the area of natural shrub regeneration.

Keywords: Forest management practices; Loess Plateau; Microbial characteristic; Soil organic carbon stability.

MeSH terms

Carbon* / analysis
China
Ecosystem
Forests
Pinus*
Soil

Substances

Soil
Carbon