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Understanding the response of soil respiration to climate variability is critical to formulate realistic predictions of future carbon (C) fluxes under different climate change scenarios. There is growing evidence that the influence of long-term climate variability in C fluxes from terrestrial ecosystems is modulated by adjustments in the aboveground-belowground links. Here, we studied the inter-annual variability in soil respiration from a wet shrubland going through successional change in North Wales (UK) during 13 years. We hypothesised that the decline in plant productivity observed over a decade would result in a decrease in the apparent sensitivity of soil respiration to soil temperature, and that rainfall variability would explain a significant fraction of the inter-annual variability in plant productivity, and consequently, in soil respiration, due to excess-water constraining nutrient availability for plants. As hypothesised, there were parallel decreases between plant productivity and annual and summer CO emissions over the 13-year period. Soil temperatures did not follow a similar trend, which resulted in a decline in the apparent sensitivity of soil respiration to soil temperature (apparent Q values decreased from 9.4 to 2.8). Contrary to our second hypothesis, summer maximum air temperature rather than rainfall was the climate variable with the greatest influence on aboveground biomass and annual cumulative respiration. Since summer air temperature and rainfall were positively associated, the greatest annual respiration values were recorded during years of high rainfall. The results suggest that adjustments in plant productivity might have a critical role in determining the long-term-sensitivity of soil respiration to changing climate conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Evaluating the response of soil organic matter decomposition to warming and changes in rainfall is critical to assess the likelihood of proposed positive feedbacks from the terrestrial to the atmospheric system. The response of soil respiration and extracellular activities (EEAs) to long-term warming and recurrent summer drought was studied in a wet shrubland ecosystem in Wales (UK), after 13 years of climate change simulation in a whole-ecosystem experiment. Over a year soil respiration, temperature and moisture was monitored in the field. During the summer season, coinciding with maximum soil respiration rates, soil inorganic N and P, microbial biomass and the extracellular activities (EEAs) of a selection of enzymes involved in C, N and P cycling were analysed. Based on previous field measurements of C and N mineralization, we expected a stronger response of C-cycling EEAs, in comparison to N-cycling EEAs, to drought and warming, and a greater sensitivity of C-cycling EEAs to drought than to warming. Drought had a clear impact on soil respiration during the summer season. However, the availability of inorganic N or P was not significantly affected by the treatments. Microbial biomass and C:N ratio also remained unchanged. In contrast to one of our hypothesis, C-cycling EEAs measured under non-optimal conditions that simulated soil environment in the field (pH of 4.1 and with a temperature incubation of 10 °C) showed no significant differences due to long-term warming and recurring drought treatments. Possibly, this assay approach may have obscured treatment effects on the soil enzyme pool. Our results highlight the need for developing methods for the in-situ analysis of EEAs to determine rates of reactions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Soil respiration (Rs) is the second largest carbon flux in terrestrial ecosystems and therefore plays a crucial role in global carbon (C) cycling. This biogeochemical process is closely related to ecosystem productivity and soil fertility and is considered as a key indicator of soil health and quality reflecting the level of microbial activity. Wildfires can have a significant effect on Rs rates and the magnitude of the impacts will depend on environmental factors such as climate and vegetation, fire severity and meteorological conditions post-fire. In this research, we aimed to assess the impacts of a wildfire on the soil CO 2 fluxes and soil respiration in a semi-arid ecosystem of Western Australia, and to understand the main edaphic and environmental drivers controlling these fluxes for different vegetation types. Our results demonstrated increased rates of Rs in the burnt areas compared to the unburnt control sites, although these differences were highly dependent on the type of vegetation cover and time since fire. The sensitivity of Rs to temperature ( Q 10) was also larger in the burnt site compared to the control. Both Rs and soil organic C were consistently higher under Eucalyptus trees, followed by Acacia shrubs. Triodia grasses had the lowest Rs rates and C contents, which were similar to those found under bare soil patches. Regardless of the site condition (unburnt or burnt), Rs was triggered during periods of higher temperatures and water availability and environmental factors (temperature and moisture) could explain a large fraction of Rs variability, improving the relationship of moisture or temperature as single factors with Rs. This study demonstrates the importance of assessing CO 2 fluxes considering both abiotic factors and vegetation types after disturbances such as fire which is particularly important in heterogeneous semi-arid areas with patchy vegetation distribution where CO 2 fluxes can be largely underestimated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Stump harvesting is one way of increasing the amount of bioenergy, but little is known about the consequences of tree-stump harvesting on the carbon balance in the forest. Therefore, soil-surface CO2 flux (soil respiration, R s) was determined two years after clear-cutting for common soil disturbances occurring after patch scarification, harrowing and stump harvest in southern Sweden. R s from intact soil was found to be of the same magnitude as emissions from areas of mixed humus, indicating only small effects of disturbance. Elevated mounds produced lower emissions than in the intact soil during the second year despite larger amounts of organic matter, probably due to low soil moisture. The lowest R s was found in soil surfaces with exposed mineral soil. The treatment effects on R s were estimated considering the actual area of different disturbances. During the first year, there was no difference in R s among the treatments, whereas in the second year the flux was 10% higher after harrowing and stump harvesting than after patch scarification, implying that the effects on CO2 flux after stump harvest were comparable to conventional harrowing. However, it is unclear whether this finding basically applies to regions where decomposition is limited by soil moisture during the summer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climatic variables have major effects on all components and processes of the global carbon (C) cycle, including soil C contents and dynamics, which in turn have significant feedback effects on the global climate. We have investigated the interactive effects between soil C and projected climatic changes using the Institute of Numerical Mathematics Climate Model (INMCM) climate–C cycle model coupled to three soil organic matter dynamics models [the Lund–Potsdam–Jena (LPJ) soil biogeochemistry, ROMUL and Q models] based on three markedly differing conceptual interpretations of soil organic matter transformation (biochemical, discrete succession and continuous quality, respectively). According to simulations using all these couplings the positive effect of CO2 fertilization on plant productivity outweighed the negative effects of increased soil temperature on soil C, consequently soils were projected to contain 10–104 Pg more C in 2100 than in the preindustrial period. However, the projected soil respiration rates tended to be higher and additional C storage lower when the LPJ soil biochemistry model was used rather than either the ROMUL or Q models. Global temperatures for 2100 predicted by the INMCM coupled to either the ROMUL or Q models were almost identical, but 0.4 °C lower than those predicted by the INMCM coupled to the LPJ soil biochemistry model. The differences in global predictions obtained with the ROMUL and Q models were smaller than expected given the fundamental difference in their formulations of the relationship between the quality and temperature sensitivity of soil organic matter decomposition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The present paper deals with C and N storage in soil and vegetation, litter fall and CO2 efflux from the soil 32–33 years after early thinning in a Norway spruce (Picea abies (L.) Karst.) stand in order to evaluate the effect of thinning regime on C sequestration. At 22 years old, the stand was reduced from 3190 to 2070, 1100 and 820 trees per hectare in four replicates. The N2070 treatment represents the recommended start density in practical forestry, while the other represent a moderate to large reduction in tree number at the present stand age. Aboveground biomass was estimated from single tree measurements of diameter and height based on allometric functions. Litter fall was collected during one and a half years and soil respiration was measured on five occasions during one summer. Ground vegetation was mapped and sampled for biomass, C and N determination. A significant decrease in aboveground tree (including stump-root system) C storage of 27% and 22% due to thinning was found in the N820 and N1100 treatments, respectively, compared to the N2070 treatment. Ground vegetation C storage was little affected by treatment, while litter fall C showed a non-significant decrease in the N820 and N1100 treatments compared to the N2070 treatment. Soil respiration was significantly lower in parts of the summer in the N2070 treatment compared to the N820 treatment. The reason for this is still unexplained since no differences in soil temperature, soil moisture or litter fall chemistry was found between the treatments. No significant treatment effects on humus and mineral soil C storage could be detected. With the present soil variability, the time period of 32 years is probably too short to detect soil C differences due to thinning. The N storage followed the same pattern as for C. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Soil carbon is returned to the atmosphere through the process of soil respiration, which represents one of the largest fluxes in the terrestrial C cycle. The effects of climate change on the components of soil respiration can affect the sink or source capacity of ecosystems for atmospheric carbon, but no current techniques can unambiguously separate soil respiration into its components. Long-term free air CO2 enrichment (FACE) experiments provide a unique opportunity to study soil C dynamics because the CO2 used for fumigation has a distinct isotopic signature and serves as a continuous label at the ecosystem level. We used the 13C tracer at the Duke Forest FACE site to follow the disappearance of C fixed before fumigation began in 1996 (pretreatment C) from soil CO2 and soil-respired CO2, as an index of belowground C dynamics during the first 8 years of the experiment. The decay of pretreatment C as detected in the isotopic composition of soil-respired CO2 and soil CO2 at 15, 30, 70, and 200 cm soil depth was best described by a model having one to three exponential pools within the soil system. The majority of soil-respired CO2 (71%) originated in soil C pools with a turnover time of about 35 days. About 55%, 50%, and 68% of soil CO2 at 15, 30, and 70 cm, respectively, originated in soil pools with turnover times of less than 1 year. The rest of soil CO2 and soil-respired CO2 originated in soil pools that turn over at decadal time scales. Our results suggest that a large fraction of the C returned to the atmosphere through soil respiration results from dynamic soil C pools that cannot be easily detected in traditionally defined soil organic matter standing stocks. Fast oxidation of labile C substrates may prevent increases in soil C accumulation in forests exposed to elevated [CO2] and may consequently result in shorter ecosystem C residence times. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Intensive management of southern pine plantations has yielded multifold increases in productivity over the last half century. The process of harvesting merchantable material and preparing a site for planting can lead to a considerable loss of organic matter. Intensively managed stands may experience more frequent disturbance as rotations decrease in length, exposing the stands to conditions that favor decomposition. To better understand the effects of organic matter removal on forest floor CO2 efflux (S ff), we measured S ff quarterly in 2001 in a 10-year-old loblolly pine (Pinus taeda L.) plantation in eastern North Carolina that received different harvest and site preparation treatments. The treatments examined were removal of merchantable bole (OM0) and whole-tree and forest floor removal (OM2). The organic matter removal treatments did not affect soil moisture or soil temperature, the major variables that control seasonal fluctuations in S ff. Mean S ff ranged from 2.23 to 6.63μmolm−2 s−1 and there were no significant differences between the treatments, despite higher lateral root mass in OM0 (1552±427gm−2) versus OM2 (701±86gm−2). In both treatments, S ff did not correlate to root mass directly beneath each measurement chamber. In OM0, S ff had a negative relationship with distance from the nearest tree, while OM2 showed no effect of tree proximity. Whole-tree and forest floor removal during harvest and site preparation did not result in differences in S ff or soil C, 10 years after establishment. Both treatments resulted in a greater quantity of soil C, indicating that the disturbance associated with harvesting enhanced soil C, at least over the short term. We attribute this increase in soil C to rapid decomposition of previous stands root system. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

We present a new soil respiration model, describe a formal model testing procedure, and compare our model with five alternative models using an extensive data set of observed soil respiration. Gas flux data from rangeland soils that included a large number of measurements at low temperatures were used to model soil CO2 emissions as a function of soil temperature and water content. Our arctangent temperature function predicts that Q10 values vary inversely with temperature and that CO2 fluxes are significant below 0 °C. Independent data representing a broad range of ecosystems and temperature values were used for model testing. The effects of plant phenology, differences in substrate availability among sites, and water limitation were accounted for so that the temperature equations could be fairly evaluated. Four of the six tested models did equally well at simulating the observed soil CO2 respiration rates. However, the arctangent variable Q10 model agreed closely with observed Q10 values over a wide range of temperatures ( r2 = 0.94) and was superior to published variable Q10 equations using the Akaike information criterion (AIC). The arctangent temperature equation explained 16–85% of the observed intra-site variability in CO2 flux rates. Including a water stress factor yielded a stronger correlation than temperature alone only in the dryland soils. The observed change in Q10 with increasing temperature was the same for data sets that included only heterotrophic respiration and data sets that included both heterotrophic and autotrophic respiration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]