Carbon pools in China's terrestrial ecosystems: New estimates based on an intensive field survey.

China's terrestrial ecosystems have functioned as important carbon sinks. However, previous estimates of carbon budgets have included large uncertainties owing to the limitations of sample size, multiple data sources, and inconsistent methodologies. In this study, we conducted an intensive field campaign involving 14,371 field plots to investigate all sectors of carbon stocks in China's forests, shrublands, grasslands, and croplands to better estimate the regional and national carbon pools and to explore the biogeographical patterns and potential drivers of these pools. The total carbon pool in these four ecosystems was 79.24 ± 2.42 Pg C, of which 82.9% was stored in soil (to a depth of 1 m), 16.5% in biomass, and 0.60% in litter. Forests, shrublands, grasslands, and croplands contained 30.83 ± 1.57 Pg C, 6.69 ± 0.32 Pg C, 25.40 ± 1.49 Pg C, and 16.32 ± 0.41 Pg C, respectively. When all terrestrial ecosystems are taken into account, the country's total carbon pool is 89.27 ± 1.05 Pg C. The carbon density of the forests, shrublands, and grasslands exhibited a strong correlation with climate: it decreased with increasing temperature but increased with increasing precipitation. Our analysis also suggests a significant sequestration potential of 1.9-3.4 Pg C in forest biomass in the next 10-20 years assuming no removals, mainly because of forest growth. Our results update the estimates of carbon pools in China's terrestrial ecosystems based on direct field measurements, and these estimates are essential to the validation and parameterization of carbon models in China and globally.

Soil changes induced by rubber and tea plantation establishment: comparison with tropical rain forest soil in Xishuangbanna, SW China.

Over the past thirty years, Xishuangbanna in Southwestern China has seen dramatic changes in land use where large areas of tropical forest and fallow land have been converted to rubber and tea plantations. In this study we evaluated the effects of land use and slope on soil properties in seven common disturbed and undisturbed land-types. Results indicated that all soils were acidic, with pH values significantly higher in the 3- and 28-year-old rubber plantations. The tropical forests had the lowest bulk densities, especially significantly lower from the top 10 cm of soil, and highest soil organic matter concentrations. Soil moisture content at topsoil was highest in the mature rubber plantation. Soils in the tropical forests and abandoned cultivated land had inorganic N (IN) concentrations approximately equal in NH(4) (+)-N and NO(3) (-)-N. However, soil IN pools were dominated by NH(4) (+)-N in the rubber and tea plantations. This trend suggests that conversion of tropical forest to rubber and tea plantations increases NH(4) (+)-N concentration and decreases NO(3) (-)-N concentration, with the most pronounced effect in plantations that are more frequently fertilized. Soil moisture content, IN, NH(4) (+)-N and NO(3) (-)-N concentrations within all sites were higher in the rainy season than in the dry season. Significant differences in the soil moisture content, and IN, NH(4) (+)-N and NO(3) (-)-N concentration was detected for both land uses and sampling season effects, as well as interactions. Higher concentrations of NH(4) (+)-N were measured at the upper slopes of all sites, but NO(3) (-)-N concentrations were highest at the lower slope in the rubber plantations and lowest at the lower slopes at all other. Thus, the conversion of tropical forests to rubber and tea plantations can have a profound effect on soil NH(4) (+)-N and NO(3) (-)-N concentrations. Options for improved soil management in plantations are discussed.

Tree species richness as an important biotic factor regulates the soil phosphorus density in China's mature natural forests.

Tree species richness has been recognized as an underlying driving factor for regulating soil phosphorus (P) status in many site-specific studies. However, it remains poorly understood whether this is true at broad scales where soil P strongly rely on climate, soil type and vegetation type. Here, based on the data of 946 mature natural forest sites from a nationwide field survey in China, we analyzed the impact of tree species richness on soil P density of China's mature natural forests (deciduous coniferous forest, DCF; evergreen coniferous forest, ECF; deciduous broad-leaved forest, DBF; evergreen broad-leaved forest, EBF; and mixed coniferous and broad-leaved forest, MF). Our results showed that tree species richness had a negative effect on soil P density in China's mature natural forests. The Random Forest regression model showed that the relative importance of tree species richness to soil P density was second only to the climate factors (mean annual temperature, MAT; mean annual precipitation, MAP). In addition, the structural equation model (SEM) results showed that the goodness fit of SEM increased when the tree species richness was included into the model. These results suggested that tree species richness was an important factor in regulating the China's mature natural forests soil P density. Furthermore, the SEM results showed that the decreased soil P density was related to the increase in ANPP and the decrease in litter P concentration induced by tree species richness. This result indicates that tree species richness could facilitate plant P absorption and inhibit plant P return into the soil, and thus reducing the soil P density in China's mature natural forests. In conclusion, we found tree species richness was an important biotic factor in regulating soil P density at broad scales, which should be fully considered in Earth models that represent P cycle.

Mapping forest type and age in China's plantations.

Forest age serves as an essential factor in determining the accuracy of historical and future carbon (C) uptake quantifications, which is especially critical for China since the forest C stock dynamics are sensitive to the fast-growing, young-age plantations. However, a spatially explicit forest age maps with specific focus on forest plantations is not available yet. In this study, we developed a 1-km resolution age and type maps of forest plantations, and quantified their uncertainties spatially using field-measured data, national forest inventory data, digitalized forest maps, and remote sensing-based forest height maps. Simulation results showed forest plantations were 16.5 years old at national scale in 2005, which is close to the age of 16.6 years old derived from the 7th national inventory data using medium age in each forest plantation group with weighted area. Interestingly, we found that human management played an important role in forest age map reconstruction, which has not yet been considered in former studies. We also suggest that forest age and type maps should be used consistently in C stock simulations to avoid biases from mismatch information. Large uncertainty found in this study suggests further endeavors are required for improving the forest age and type maps.

Climate and litter C/N ratio constrain soil organic carbon accumulation.

Soil organic carbon (SOC) plays critical roles in stabilizing atmospheric CO2 concentration, but the mechanistic controls on the amount and distribution of SOC on global scales are not well understood. In turn, this has hampered the ability to model global C budgets and to find measures to mitigate climate change. Here, based on the data from a large field survey campaign with 2600 plots across China's forest ecosystems and a global collection of published data from forested land, we find that a low litter carbon-to-nitrogen ratio (C/N) and high wetness index (P/PET, precipitation-to-potential-evapotranspiration ratio) are the two factors that promote SOC accumulation, with only minor contributions of litter quantity and soil texture. The field survey data demonstrated that high plant diversity decreased litter C/N and thus indirectly promoted SOC accumulation by increasing the litter quality. We conclude that any changes in plant-community composition, plant-species richness and environmental factors that can reduce the litter C/N ratio, or climatic changes that increase wetness index, may promote SOC accumulation. The study provides a guideline for modeling the carbon cycle of various ecosystem scales and formulates the principle for land-based actions for mitigating the rising atmospheric CO2 concentration.

Different spatial patterns of nitrogen and phosphorus resorption efficiencies in China's forests.

Nutrient resorption is an important internal-strategy for plant to retain nutrients. However, the spatial patterns of nitrogen and phosphorus resorption efficiencies (NRE, PRE) in national scales are still unexplored. In this study, we first estimated the magnitudes of NRE and PRE, and explored their spatial patterns across China's forests based on the dataset from a nation-wide field campaign from 2011 to 2015. Mean NRE was estimated to be 35.64% and higher than mean PRE (43.72%). The main effects of forest type and the interactions between climatic zone and land use were significant for both NRE and PRE. In addition, NRE and PRE exhibited different patterns along climatic gradients and nutrient status. Our results can shed light on the nutrient strategies of China's forests under future environmental changes and the results could be used in global biogeochemical models.

[Estimation of topographical factors in revised universal soil loss model based on maximum up-stream flow path].

By using maximum upstream flow path, a self-developed new method for calculating slope length value based on Arc Macro Language (AML), five groups of DEM data for different regions in Bijie Prefecture of Guizhou Province were extracted to compute the slope length and topographical factors in the Prefecture. The time cost for calculating the slope length and the values of the topographical factors were analyzed, and compared with those by iterative slope length method based on AML (ISLA) and on C++ (ISLC). The results showed that the new method was feasible to calculate the slope length and topographical factors in revised universal soil loss model, and had the same effect as iterative slope length method. Comparing with ISLA, the new method had a high computing efficiency and greatly decreased the time consumption, and could be applied to a large area to estimate the slope length and topographical factors based on AML. Comparing with ISLC, the new method had the similar computing efficiency, but its coding was easily to be written, modified, and debugged by using AML. Therefore, the new method could be more broadly used by GIS users.

[Radiation characteristics in a tropical seasonal rain forest canopy gap].

Based on the observations in the radiation with different wavelengths in tropical seasonal rain forest canopy gap, interior of forest, and meteorological station in different seasons, the radiation characteristics of canopy gap were discussed. The results showed that the value of different wavelength radiation had the phenomenon of "suddenly emergent" at the center and north edge of canopy gap. Moreover, each radiation value reached the maximum rapidly, and then decreased quickly around the noon. The daily gross radiation of different wavelengths within the canopy gap was bigger than that in the interior of forest, but smaller than that at meteorological station. Compared to the north edge, the daily gross radiation in the center of the gap was bigger in dry-hot season, rain season and later rain season, but smaller in fog-cool season, which was influenced by dense fog, solar angle and azimuth. The total daily gross solar radiation at the center was the maximum when the solar angle was the biggest in rain season, higher in later rain season and dry-hot season, and was the minimum in fog-cool season. The ratios of infrared and visible light radiation to total solar radiation varied with the seasons at the center and north edge of the canopy gap, which fully indicated the environmental heterogeneity within the canopy gap. Compared with meteorological station and interior of forest, the ratios of infrared radiation to total solar radiation in the gap were bigger than those of meteorological station, but smaller than those of interior of forest, which were just contrary to the ratios of visible light to total solar radiation. In addition, the seasonal variation of the ratios of visible light to total solar radiation was higher than that of the ratios of infrared radiation to total solar radiation within the gap. Generally, canopy gap could increase infrared radiation and decrease visible light radiation in tropical seasonal rainforest.

[A primary study on thermal effect of soil-plant-atmosphere continuum in tropical seasonal rain forest gap].

Made use of measurement data of microclimatic elements of canopy gap in tropical seasonal rain forest in fog-cool and dry-hot season in Xishuangbanna, the daytime characteristics of temporal-spatial distribution and variation of soil surface temperature, air temperature, and leaf temperature of understory plants in canopy gap were discussed. The finding showed that influenced by fog and solar altitude, the maximum value of microclimatic elements displayed at different site of gap in different time and season and there existed phenomenon about higher value area of leaf temperature dynamic displacement. In addition, the direction of heat transferring of soil-plant-atmosphere continuum varied with time and season, indeed at the same time, the different part of gap had the different heat transferring directions. The results would supply a research basis for further studying heat and water vapor transport, microclimatic formation, biodiversity and succession of canopy gap.

[Temporal-spatial distribution characteristics of microclimate in tropical secondary forest canopy gap in Xishuangbanna].

Based on the data obtained from vertical gradient measurements of microclimatic elements of canopy gap in tropical secondary forest of Xishuangbanna in fog-cool and dry-hot season, the daytime characteristics of temporal-spatial distribution and variation of trunk surface temperature, air temperature, water vapor pressure and relative humidity in canopy gap were discussed. The data showed that gap edge had not only a remarkable thermal effect, but also a significant water vapor effect. These effects resulted in environmental heterogeneity in canopy gap. The results provided a basis for further studying heat and water vapor transport, microclimatic formation, biodiversity, and forest succession in canopy gap.