Comment on bg-2021-270

Abstract

Northern peatlands are globally significant carbon stores, but the sink strength may vary from year-to-year due to variations in environmental and biogeochemical conditions. This variation is mainly brought about by changes in primary production and ecosystem respiration. The processes that relate to variations in autotrophic respiration (AR; respiration by plant parts) are understood quite well, but heterotrophic respiration (HR; respiration by microbial bacteria in the soil, fungi, etc.) is crudely measured and modelled. This will lead to biased estimates if a change favours one form of respiration over another and alters allocations of carbon to labile pools with different turnover rates. HR has only recently been shown to be more intimately linked to vegetation dynamics than once thought, particularly in wetter, oligotrophic, sedge-dominated ecosystems. The objective of this study is to determine the factors that relate to the spatial and temporal variability in respiration and its autotrophic and heterotrophic components in an ombrotrophic bog (Mer Bleue) where woody shrubs are dominant, and to see if the more dynamic nature of HR in sedges also exists in this bog. Plot level measurements using manual chambers were used to partition respiration from both the dominant shrubs and the sparse sedges at the site, and the controls on respiration were explored by measuring a variety of environmental variables, such as air and soil temperatures (T) and water table (WT) depth. Results show that AR and HR correlate primarily with air and soil T, with WT depth playing an important role in some cases, and that a higher variability in respiration exists for the shrub plots than the sedge plots, especially when WT levels are more variable. Our findings also show that a plant’s response to changes in climate or land-use is related to different mechanisms of obtaining water resources and utilizing symbiotic relationships with other plants around them. These results will improve our understanding of peatland carbon cycling, as well as improve the conceptualization of HR.