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Schlesinger, William H.; Pilmanis, Adrienne M.

doi:10.1023/a:1005939924434

Cited by 460 publications

(73 citation statements)

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“…Plants often play a role as 'ion pumps' of elements in a plantÁsoil system. In other words, plants absorb mineral elements from the soil through roots in both lateral and vertical directions to support aboveground production; upon senescence, they release these elements to surface soils underneath plant canopies, creating 'islands of fertility' (Schlesinger & Pilmanis 1998). Preliminary data from the study site suggest that tissues of A. frigida are more concentrated in Ca and Mg (Ca, 0.36%; Mg, 0.68%) than S. brevifora (Ca, 0.13%; Mg, 0.25%).…”

Section: Grassland Restoration Following Grazer Removalmentioning

confidence: 99%

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 Removalmentioning

confidence: 99%

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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“…In semi-arid woodlands, vegetation cover is highly variable, with large patches of bare ground between vegetation patches, resulting in large spatial variations in C, N and P concentrations (e.g. Lal, 2004;Schlesinger and Pilmanis, 1998). Generally soils under vegetation canopies have higher organic carbon (OC) content than interspaces because of the greater C input (White et al, 2009).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Response of respiration and nutrient availability to drying and rewetting in soil from a semi-arid woodland depends on vegetation patch and a recent wildfire

2015

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Abstract. Semi-arid woodlands, which are characterised by patchy vegetation interspersed with bare, open areas, are frequently exposed to wildfire. During summer, long dry periods are occasionally interrupted by rainfall events. It is well known that rewetting of dry soil induces a flush of respiration. However, the magnitude of the flush may differ between vegetation patches and open areas because of different organic matter content, which could be further modulated by wildfire. Soils were collected from under trees, under shrubs or in open areas in unburnt and burnt sandy mallee woodland, where part of the woodland experienced a wildfire which destroyed or damaged most of the aboveground plant parts 4 months before sampling. In an incubation experiment, the soils were exposed to two moisture treatments: constantly moist (CM) and drying and rewetting (DRW). In CM, soils were incubated at 80 % of maximum water holding capacity (WHC) for 19 days; in DRW, soils were dried for 4 days, kept dry for another 5 days, then rewetted to 80 % WHC and maintained at this water content until day 19. Soil respiration decreased during drying and was very low in the dry period; rewetting induced a respiration flush. Compared to soil under shrubs and in open areas, cumulative respiration per gram of soil in CM and DRW was greater under trees, but lower when expressed per gram of total organic carbon (TOC). Organic matter content, available P, and microbial biomass C, but not available N, were greater under trees than in open areas. Wild fire decreased the flush of respiration per gram of TOC in the open areas and under shrubs, and reduced TOC and microbial biomass C (MBC) concentrations only under trees, but had little effect on available N and P concentrations. We conclude that the impact of wildfire and DRW events on nutrient cycling differs among vegetation patches of a native semi-arid woodland which is related to organic matter amount and availability.

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“…Compared with temporal variation of soil respiration, which can be frequently well explained by environment factors such as soil temperature and soil moisture, the spatial variation of SR tends to be more complicated because of its high spatial variation, especially in semiarid and arid areas [8] [10]. As a result, there are always cases that no evident controlling factor could be detected with significant spatial variations, except that variables related to forest structure may have explained some of the variation of soil respiration [50].…”

Section: Spatial Variations Of Soil Respiration In Three Ecosystemsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…As a result, there are always cases that no evident controlling factor could be detected with significant spatial variations, except that variables related to forest structure may have explained some of the variation of soil respiration [50]. Generally, different positions apart from a plant have been investigated for spatial heterogeneity of SR in arid ecosystems, in which the existence of vegetation might play an important role in manipulating the spatial heterogeneity [10] [11], e.g., Ma, et al [19] designed an experiment in an adjacent site near TE to measure SR rates along a transect from the site near plant stem to the interplant space to capture individual-based variation and suggested that SR rates decreased with the increase of distance away from the plant stem. In addition, Wang, et al [45] found that the location of the high value positions of soil moisture, soil microbial biomass carbon and soil respiration were clearly around the positions of scrubs.…”

Section: Spatial Variations Of Soil Respiration In Three Ecosystemsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Understanding on spatial variation of soil respiration is crucial to estimate representative soil respiration within an ecosystem [9], including those in arid areas, where the distribution of ecological factors and organisms is markedly patchy [10] [11]. As pointed out by [11], spatial variations of soil characteristics are largely controlled by the spatial organization of perennial plants in desert ecosystems, noted as "islands of fertility".…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Spatial Variations of Soil Respiration in Arid Ecosystems

Liu¹,

Sonobe²,

Wang³

2016

OJE

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Soil respiration releases a major carbon flux back to atmosphere and thus plays an important role in global carbon cycling. Soil respiration is well known for its significant spatial variation in terrestrial ecosystems, especially in fragile ecosystems of arid land, where vegetation is distributed sparsely and the climate changes dramatically. In this study, soil respiration in three typical arid ecosystems: desert ecosystem (DE), desert-farmland transition ecosystem (TE) and farmland ecosystem (FE) in an arid area of northwestern China were studied for their spatial variations in 2012 and 2013. Along with soil respiration (SR), soil surface temperature (ST), soil moisture (SM) and soil electrical conductivity (ECb) were also recorded to investigate the spatial variations and the correlations among them. The results revealed that averaged soil respiration rate was much lower in DE than those in TE and FE. No single factor could adequately explain the variation of soil respiration, except a negative relationship between soil temperature and soil respiration in FE (P < 0.05). Geostatistical analysis showed that the spatial heterogeneity of soil respiration in DE was insignificant but notably in both TE and FE, especially in FE, which was mainly attributed to the different vegetation or soil moisture characteristics in the three ecosystems. The results obtained in this study will help to provide a better understanding on spatial variations of soil respiration and soil properties in arid ecosystems and also on macroscale carbon cycling evaluations.

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Cited by 460 publications

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Grazing exclusion alters ecosystem carbon pools in Alxa desert steppe

Grazing exclusion alters ecosystem carbon pools in Alxa desert steppe

Response of respiration and nutrient availability to drying and rewetting in soil from a semi-arid woodland depends on vegetation patch and a recent wildfire

Spatial Variations of Soil Respiration in Arid Ecosystems

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