Abstract
BackgroundUntil recently, a lot of arable lands were abandoned in many countries of the world and, especially, in Russia, where about half a million square kilometers of arable lands were abandoned in 1961-2007. The soils at these fallows undergo a process of natural restoration (or self-restoration) that changes the balance of soil organic matter (SOM) supply and mineralization.ResultsA soil chronosequence study, covering the ecosystems of 3, 20, 55, 100, and 170 years of self-restoration in southern taiga zone, shows that soil organic content of mineral horizons remains relatively stable during the self-restoration. This does not imply, however, that SOM pools remain steady. The C/N ratio of active SOM reached steady state after 55 years, and increased doubly (from 12.5 - 15.6 to 32.2-33.8). As to the C/N ratio of passive SOM, it has been continuously increasing (from 11.8-12.7 to 19.0-22.8) over the 170 years, and did not reach a steady condition.ConclusionThe results of the study imply that soil recovery at the abandoned arable sandy lands of taiga is incredibly slow process. Not only soil morphological features of a former ploughing remained detectable but also the balance of soil organic matter input and mineralization remained unsteady after 170 years of self-restoration.
Highlights
Until recently, a lot of arable lands were abandoned in many countries of the world and, especially, in Russia, where about half a million square kilometers of arable lands were abandoned in 1961-2007
The total soil organic carbon (SOC) contents stayed relatively constant during self-restoration (Table 1)
As Glomalin is a protein produced by arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi during colonization, Glomalin concentration is correlated to the abundance of metabolizing roots [19]
Summary
A lot of arable lands were abandoned in many countries of the world and, especially, in Russia, where about half a million square kilometers of arable lands were abandoned in 1961-2007. The soils at these fallows undergo a process of natural restoration (or self-restoration) that changes the balance of soil organic matter (SOM) supply and mineralization. Additional podzolization features were found in respect to morphology and chemical properties like pH, exchangeable cations, and nutrition dynamics These changes happened rather fast, the ploughing features were still evident after 170 years of self-restoration, as found in other studies [1,2,5,6]
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