Cyanobacteria and moss biocrusts increase evaporation by regulating surface soil moisture and temperature on the northern Loess Plateau, China

Abstract

Soil evaporation is a three-stage process and plays a vital role in soil physical, chemical, and biological processes, as well as global climate change. As an important living skin, biocrusts strongly influence most soil properties and support fundamental ecosystem functions. Although there are many studies concerning biocrust effects on surface soil hydrological processes, it still remains unclear how biocrusts impact soil evaporation and their potential effects on the water budget in drylands. In this study, we selected aeolian sandy soil (bare soil) and three types of biocrusts, specifically cyanobacteria (cyano), cyanobacteria and moss mixed crusts (cyano-moss), and moss crusts (moss), on the northern Chinese Loess Plateau. By utilizing weighing micro-lysimeters in simulated and ∼4 months in-situ field evaporation experiments, we investigated all evaporation stages containing stages I–II and III, as well as the soil evaporation rate (E) of all treatments. The soil moisture (θ) and temperature (T) at 2 cm and 10 cm depths were also measured in field. Our results showed that biocrust types strongly influenced E in the ranked order of moss > cyano-moss > cyano > bare soil. The cumulative evaporation amount (Ec) of all types of biocrusts was significantly higher than that of bare soil in simulated experiments. Particularly, moss increased Ec by 15.7% compared with bare soil. The results of in-situ field measurements illustrated that the E of cyano, cyano-moss, and moss was increased by 42.4%, 55.5%, and 46.9%, respectively, compared with the bare soil, and these increasing effects became more pronounced after rainfall events. Additionally, all types of biocrusts markedly increased θ and decreased T at 0–10 cm depth of soil, but cyano and cyano-moss increased T (by up to 5.7 °C) at 2 cm depth during the non-rainfall periods. The increasing effects of biocrusts on E were reasonably attributed to their higher contents of fine particles and organic matter, as well as their higher field capacity in contrast to bare soil. All these regulations of biocrusts on soil properties further reshaped soil water and temperature regimes and finally changed soil evaporation. In conclusion, biocrusts may greatly intensify surface soil water loss due to their higher E. However, their greater θ and lower T in comparison to bare soil may partially offset these negative effects in return, and they may have feedback impacts on surface soil water and heat balances in drylands.