Short-Term Effects of Different Forest Management Methods on Soil Microbial Communities of a Natural Quercus aliena var. acuteserrata Forest in Xiaolongshan, China

Abstract

One of the aims of sustainable forest management is to preserve the diversity and resilience of ecosystems. Unfortunately, changes in the soil microbial communities after forest management remain unclear. We analyzed and compared the soil microbial community of a natural Quercus aliena var. acuteserrata forest after four years of four different management methods using high-throughput sequencing technology. The forest management methods were close-to-nature management (CNFM), structure-based forest management (SBFM), secondary forest comprehensive silviculture (SFCS) and unmanaged control (CK). The results showed that: (1) the soil microbial community diversity indices were not significantly different among the different management methods. (2) The relative abundance of Proteobacteria in the SBFM treatment was lower than in the CK treatment, while the relative abundance of Acidobacteria in the SBFM was significantly higher than that in the CK treatment. The relative abundance of Ascomycota was highest in the CNFM treatment, and that of Basidiomycota was lowest in the CNFM treatment. However, the relative abundance of dominant bacterial and fungal phyla was not significantly different in CK and SFCS. (3) Redundancy analysis (RDA) showed that the soil organic matter (SOM), total nitrogen (TN), and available nitrogen (AN) significantly correlated with the bacterial communities, and the available potassium (AK) was the only soil nutrient, which significantly correlated with the composition of the fungal communities. The short-term SBFM treatment altered microbial bacterial community compositions, which may be attributed to the phyla present (e.g., Proteobacteria and Acidobacteria), and the short-term CNFM treatment altered microbial fungal community compositions, which may be attributed to the phyla present (e.g., Ascomycota and Basidiomycota). Furthermore, soil nutrients could affect the dominant soil microbial communities, and its influence was greater on the bacterial community than on the fungal community.

Impacts of close-to-nature management on the stand states of Masson pine forests

“…The performance of stand parameters under CTNM (Tables 4-5, Figure 3) indirectly supported this viewpoint because more heterogeneous stand parameters were found where CTNM practices had rapidly modified the stand state. Multiple studies have verified that the greater the heterogeneity, the better the stand quality (de Leso et al 2016, Rehush and Waser 2017, Wan et al 2019 and CTNM is an effective method for improving the quality of plantation forests (He et al 2018). The main reason for our finding was that in Masson pine forest after CTNM, the stand density decreased and, therefore, competition was reduced among the remaining trees for water, nutrients and living space.…”

“…Thinning is an essential forestry practice (Shen et al 2017). Numerous studies and observations have shown that thinning induces a change in the succession and recovery of forests, including stand structure, species composition, and vegetation cover (de Groot et al 2016, Nagel et al 2017, Wan et al 2019. The dynamics of stand states after thinning can be used to understand the mechanisms of CTNM for sustainable forestry.…”

Conversion of Secondary Forests into Chestnut Forests Affects Soil Nutrients in Anji County, China

“…Through the study, Meng et al [35] found that, after forest conversion, it can influence soil bacteria communities. Wan et al [36] studied on the effect of forest management methods on soil bacteria communities; they found that forest management method could affect soil bacteria community and soil nutrient. Different soil bacteria communities can cause differences in litter decomposition rates and thus affect soil nutrients.…”

Short-Term Effects of Cover Grass on Soil Microbial Communities in an Apple Orchard on the Loess Plateau

“…Soil water content (SWC) was determined by drying method [31] and soil temperature (T) was measured using the soil temperature instrument (Table 1). Soil pH, organic carbon (SOC), total nitrogen (TN), available nitrogen (AN), total phosphorus (TP), available phosphorus (AP), total potassium (TK) and available potassium (AK) were measured; for details of the measurement method, refer to Wan et al [32]. The concentrations of soil microbial biomass carbon (MBC) and nitrogen (MBN) were analyzed by fumigation extraction [33].…”