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Spatial variability of soil moisture at typical alpine meadow and steppe sites in the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau permafrost region

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Abstract

Permafrost degradation has the potential to significantly change soil moisture. The objective of this study was to assess the variability of soil moisture in a permafrost region using geostatistical techniques. The experiment was conducted in August 2008 in alpine steppe and meadow located in the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau permafrost region. Four soil depths (0–10, 10–20, 20–30 and 30–40 cm) were analyzed using frequency domain reflectometry, and sampling made of 80 points in a 10 m × 10 m grid were sampled. Soil moisture was analyzed using classical statistics to appropriately describe central tendency and dispersion, and then using geostatistics to describe spatial variability. Classical statistical method indicated that soil moisture in the permafrost region had a normal distribution pattern. Mean surface soil moisture in alpine meadow was higher than that in alpine steppe. The semivariograms showed that soil moisture variability in alpine cold steppe was larger than that in alpine meadow, which decreased with depths. Nugget values in alpine steppe were low (0.1–4.5), in contrast to alpine cold meadow. Soil moisture in alpine steppe had highly structured spatial variability with more than 93.4% spatial heterogeneity, and the range decreased with depth. Soil moisture content in alpine cold meadow had a moderate spatial dependence with a range of 51.3–169.2 m, increasing with depth.

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Acknowledgments

This study was funded by NKBRSF, PR China (No. 2005CB422005) and the National Basic Task Project (2006FY110200).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 11A Datun Road, Chaoyang District, Beijing, 100101, People’s Republic of China

    Zhaoping Yang, Hua Ouyang, Xianzhou Zhang, Xingliang Xu, Caiping Zhou & Wenbin Yang

  2. Nanjing Institute of Environmental Sciences, Ministry of Environmental Protection, Nanjing, 210042, China

    Zhaoping Yang

  3. International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development, G.P.O. Box 3226, Khumaltar, Kathmandu, Nepal

    Hua Ouyang

  4. Graduate School of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100049, China

    Zhaoping Yang

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  1. Zhaoping Yang
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  2. Hua Ouyang
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  3. Xianzhou Zhang
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  4. Xingliang Xu
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  5. Caiping Zhou
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Correspondence to Hua Ouyang.

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Yang, Z., Ouyang, H., Zhang, X. et al. Spatial variability of soil moisture at typical alpine meadow and steppe sites in the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau permafrost region. Environ Earth Sci 63, 477–488 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12665-010-0716-y

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