Changes in soil organic carbon and its influencing factors in the growth of Pinus sylvestris var. mongolica plantation in Horqin Sandy Land, Northeast China

Zeyong Lei,Yansong Zhang,Deliang Yu,Yanping Zhou,Fengyan Zhou,Yangang Han,Dongwei Yu

doi:10.1038/s41598-019-52945-5

Abstract

The change of soil organic carbon and its influencing factors after afforestation in sandy land should be taken into account. Here, the factors would be revealed which would influence the SOC dynamics to a depth of 100 cm during the development of Mongolian pine plantations in Horqin sandy land, northeast China. The chronosequence method was used to quantify the change of SOC in vertical distribution and influencing factors following conversion grassland to Pinus sylvestris var. mongolica forest in semi-arid sandy land, northeast China. Then the traditional statistical approaches were used to assessed the influence of the identified factors. Stand age played a major role in SOC dynamics. It took 38 years for SOC in 0–10 cm layer to recover to its initial level after afforestation, and 46 years for 10–20 cm layer. SOC accumulation increased with the age of Mongolian pine plantation. Over-mature forest fully embodied the advantage of SOC accumulation. In addition, the changes of SOC in 0–10 cm layer were also affected by TN, TP, TK and soil moisture, and those below 10 cm soil layers were related to the effects of TN, TP, TK, BD and CS.

Highlights

Land use change is the main factor that drives changes in soil organic carbon (SOC) stocks and the global carbon cycle[1]
The analysis of SOC in Pinus sylvestris var. mongolica forest of different growth stages revealed that at 13 yrs, the amount of SOC was increased in the 10–100 cm layer but significantly decreased in the 0–10 cm layer
At 44 yrs, the SOC in the 0–10 cm layer recovered to the initial grassland level and increased slightly, and the level in the 10–20 cm soil layer remained lower than the initial level, while others were increased

Summary

Introduction

Land use change is the main factor that drives changes in soil organic carbon (SOC) stocks and the global carbon cycle[1]. The distribution of SOC is largely heterogeneous because the soil properties[4], site characteristics[5,6], plant species[1,7], environment[4,5,8,9,10,11,12], land use[7,11,13,14,15] and management[16,17], the dynamic carbon processes differ and the responses to external environmental changes are distinct between the surface and deep soil. Mongolica in sandy land, namely that the factors influencing the amount of SOC vary with stand age and differ from those influencing the SOC of topsoil and deep soil layer. The data of SOC and other soil properties were derived from 20 sites, laboratory testing and calculation from Horqin sandy land, northeast China

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion