Soil carbon stock in relation to plant diversity of homegardens in Kerala, India

Saha, Subhrajit; Nair, P. K. R.; Nair, Vimala D.; Kumar, B. Mohan

doi:10.1007/s10457-009-9228-8

Cited by 137 publications

(64 citation statements)

References 26 publications

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“…We found a significant negative effect of plant diversity on soil total carbon, which is largely inconsistent with many related studies on biodiversity and soil total carbon sequestration (Steinbeiss et al 2008;Saha et al 2009;Nielsen et al 2011). This negative result may be explained by both the decrease of total carbon input to and the increase of output from the soil.…”

Section: Discussioncontrasting

confidence: 99%

Multivariate control of root biomass in a semi-arid grassland on the Loess Plateau, China

Zhu

et al. 2014

Plant Soil

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Aim Root biomass has long been under-represented in biodiversity-ecosystem functioning studies, despite its dominance in biomass in many arid and semi-arid ecosystems. We aimed to explore the multivariate control over root biomass by plant diversity, together with other biotic and abiotic factors and to evaluate the relative importance of these factors. Methods Above-and below-ground traits of 13 communities and soil properties were measured in semi-arid grasslands on the Loess Plateau, China. Structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to evaluate the relative importance of the community and soil characteristics, emphasizing the direct and indirect effects of plant diversity on root biomass. Results Significant indirect effects of plant species richness on root biomass were found, although no direct correlation was detected between them. In the indirect pathways, plant species richness showed a positive effect on soil total nitrogen, but a significant negative influence on soil total carbon. Soil total nitrogen and plant diversity had the largest and smallest total effect respectively on root biomass in the model. Conclusions Plant species richness was not the strongest determinant of root biomass but had a significant indirect effect, mediated through soil total carbon and nitrogen. This study suggests that greater plant species richness, through a positive influence on soil total nitrogen, may indirectly promote root carbon stock.

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Section: Discussioncontrasting

confidence: 99%

Multivariate control of root biomass in a semi-arid grassland on the Loess Plateau, China

Zhu

et al. 2014

Plant Soil

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“…and in the Meegahakiula area (SWI: 1.55 to 1.77; intermediate zone; Senanayake et al 2009). The estimated SWI is also higher than the mean SWI found in homegardens from two villages in West Bengal, India and six villages in Dhaka Division, Bangladesh (APN, 2012), but lower than in Kerala homegardens in India (Saha et al 2009). Mean Shannon-Wiener diversity indices in tropical homegardens have been reported to vary broadly from 0.93 in rural Zambia (Drescher 1998) to almost 3.0 in West Java, Indonesia (Karyono 1990).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 58%

Quantification of carbon stock and tree diversity of homegardens in a dry zone area of Moneragala district, Sri Lanka

et al. 2014

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Homegarden agroforestry systems are suggested to hold a large potential for climate change mitigation and adaptation. This is due to their multifunctional role in providing income, food and ecosystem services while decreasing pressure on natural forests and hence saving and storing carbon. In this paper, above-ground biomass carbon and tree species diversity of trees was quantified in homegardens around two villages in the dry south-eastern part of Moneragala district of Sri Lanka. A total of 45 dry zone homegardens were sampled on size, diameter at breast height, tree height and species diversity. Using allometric equations, we find a mean above-ground biomass stock of 13 Mega grams of carbon per hectare (Mg C ha -1 ) with a large range among homegardens (1 to 56 Mg C ha -1 , n=45) due to a variation of tree diversity and composition between individual homegardens. Mean above-ground carbon stock per unit area was higher in small homegardens (0.2 ha, 26 Mg C ha -1 , n=11) and statistically different compared to medium (0.4-0.8 ha, 9 Mg C ha -1 , n=27) and large (1.0-1.2 ha, 8 Mg C ha -1 , n=7) homegardens. In total, 4,278 trees were sampled and 70 tree species identified and recorded. The Shannon Wiener index were used to evaluate diversity per homegarden and ranged from 0.76 to 3.01 with a mean value of 2.05  0.07 indicating a medium evenly distributed diversity of sampled tree species. The results show a vast heterogeneity in terms of carbon stock and tree diversity within the less studied dry zone homegardens; results that contribute to more knowledge of their expansion potential as well as climate mitigation and adaptation potential. The results are also useful for whether homegardens should be considered to be included as an activity to enhance natural forest cover within Sri Lanka's newly commenced UN-REDD National Programme.

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“…Increasing plant species diversity has been proposed as contributing to greater ecosystem C sequestration (Fornara & Tilman 2008;Saha et al 2009). We found a significant though relatively weak effect of plant diversity on below-ground and total C storage, which was considerably less than the direct effects of fire and plant species composition.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Structural equation modelling reveals plant-community drivers of carbon storage in boreal forest ecosystems

2009

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Boreal forest ecosystems are important drivers of the global carbon (C) cycle by acting as both sinks and sources of atmospheric CO 2 . While several factors have been proposed as determining the ability of boreal forest to function as C sinks, little is known about their relative importance. In this study, we applied structural equation modelling to a previously published dataset involving 30 boreal-forested islands that vary greatly in their historic fire regime, in order to explore the simultaneous influence of several factors believed to be important in influencing above-ground, below-ground and total ecosystem C accumulation. We found that wildfire was a major driver of ecosystem C sequestration, and exerted direct effects on below-ground C storage (presumably through humus combustion) and indirect effects on both above-ground and below-ground C storage through altering plant-community composition. By contrast, plant diversity influenced only below-ground C storage (and even then only weakly), while net primary productivity and decomposition had no detectable effect. Our results suggest that while boreal forests have great potential for storing significant amounts of C, traits of dominant plant species that promote below-ground C accumulation and the absence of wildfire are the most important drivers of C sequestration in these ecosystems.

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Soil carbon stock in relation to plant diversity of homegardens in Kerala, India

Cited by 137 publications

References 26 publications

Multivariate control of root biomass in a semi-arid grassland on the Loess Plateau, China

Multivariate control of root biomass in a semi-arid grassland on the Loess Plateau, China

Quantification of carbon stock and tree diversity of homegardens in a dry zone area of Moneragala district, Sri Lanka

Structural equation modelling reveals plant-community drivers of carbon storage in boreal forest ecosystems

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