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Watering increased DOC concentration but decreased N2O emission from a mixed grassland soil under different defoliation regimes

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Abstract

Changes in grazing regime and climatic conditions (such as precipitation) may affect soil N2O emissions; however, such effects have been inconsistent in grasslands. This study investigated the impact of simulated grazing, increased precipitation and N addition on soil N2O emissions, as well as soil dissolved organic carbon (DOC) concentrations, from a mixed grassland site in southern Alberta, Canada. A batch incubation study was conducted on soils (0–10 cm) collected from long-term field plots exposed to defoliation at either high intensity at low frequency (HILF) or high intensity at high frequency (HIHF) or low intensity at high frequency (LIHF) throughout the growing season (May–August). A deferred control (DC) treatment was also included where defoliation only occurred once at year end. All defoliation treatments formed a full factorial experiment with the watering treatment (ambient moisture (AM) or watering (W)) in the field. Soil N2O production was also quantified under an N addition treatment (no N and addition of 20 mg N kg−1 (NH4)2SO4) in the laboratory incubation experiment. Defoliation had no influence (p > 0.05) on soil DOC concentrations and cumulative N2O emissions. Watering increased DOC concentrations by 72–234 % but decreased N2O emissions by 33–60 %. Increments in N2O emissions after N addition were greater in the W (111–163 %) than the AM (64–67 %) treatment. Our results suggest that while defoliation regimes did not affect soil N2O emissions, watering may induce greater N2O loss in the more arid soil and N addition may further increase N2O loss under high precipitation within soils of the dry mixed grassland ecosystem.

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Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank Sixi Zhu, Kangyi Lou, Yike Shen, Erica Schell, and Caroline Martin for their assistance in the field and laboratory. We also thank Editor-in-Chief and two anonymous reviewers for their valuable suggestions that improved an earlier version of the manuscript. Funding for this research was provided by the Rangeland Research Institute and the Mattheis Research Ranch, University of Alberta; the National Natural Science Foundation of China (41573070); and the Open Fund of the State Key Laboratory of Soil and Sustainable Agriculture, Institute of Soil Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences (Y412201403).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Renewable Resources, University of Alberta, 442 Earth Sciences Building, Edmonton, Alberta, T6G 2E3, Canada

    Yanjiang Cai, Scott X. Chang & Bin Ma

  2. Key Laboratory of Mountain Environment Evolvement and Regulation, Institute of Mountain Hazards and Environment, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Chengdu, 610041, China

    Yanjiang Cai

  3. State Key Laboratory of Soil and Sustainable Agriculture, Institute of Soil Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Nanjing, 210008, China

    Yanjiang Cai

  4. Department of Agricultural, Food and Nutritional Science, University of Alberta, 410 Agriculture/Forestry Centre, Edmonton, Alberta, T6G 2P5, Canada

    Edward W. Bork

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  1. Yanjiang Cai
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Correspondence to Scott X. Chang.

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Cai, Y., Chang, S.X., Ma, B. et al. Watering increased DOC concentration but decreased N2O emission from a mixed grassland soil under different defoliation regimes. Biol Fertil Soils 52, 987–996 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00374-016-1135-3

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