Abstract
Purpose
Grasslands are facing the threat of climate change and intensive land use. Soil respiration (Rs) in grassland ecosystems can be potentially altered by changes in precipitation and land use. We aimed to quantify the impact of changes in precipitation and common land use practices in an Inner Mongolia grassland, i.e., mowing and grazing, on soil respiration.
Methods
We performed an in situ experiment with altered precipitation (+ 50%, ambient, and -50%) and land use (control or fencing, mowing, and grazing) to explore their impacts on soil respiration and its autotrophic (Ra) and heterotrophic (Rh) components.
Results
Altered precipitation had stronger impacts on abiotic and biotic drivers than land use, leading to stronger impacts on Rs and its components. Over the 3-year experiment, Rs, Ra and Rh decreased by 36%, 42% and 33% with reduced precipitation and increased by 29%, 36% and 25% with increased precipitation, respectively. Grazing and mowing caused relatively small decreases in Rs compared to fencing (generally < 10%). However, precipitation and land use interactively impacted abiotic and biotic drivers and thus Rs. The decrease in Rs with reduced precipitation was greater with grazing (38%) and mowing (37%) than with fencing (32%).
Conclusions
Rs and its components may decrease under the projected decrease in precipitation and may further decrease with grazing and mowing compared to fencing. Therefore, land use should be considered when predicting grassland carbon cycling in response to future precipitation changes.
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Data availability
The data that support the findings of this study are openly available in Figshare at https://figshare.com/s/9c5609041dd7e8c609bd.
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Acknowledgements
The authors thank Taogetao Baoyin, Hugjiltu Minggagud and other researchers and workers at the Grassland Ecosystem Research Station of Inner Mongolia University for assistance in maintaining the experiment. This study was supported by the National Key Research and Development Program of China (2016YFC0500602), the Strategic Priority Research Program of Chinese Academy of Sciences (XDA26010101), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (31971434, 32160274, 31960259 and 31600385), the Ministry of Science and Technology of China (2015BAC02B04), the Natural Science Foundation of Inner Mongolia (2019MS03088, 2019MS03089 and 2015ZD05) and Inner Mongolia Programs for Science and Technology Development (2019GG014). We also sincerely thank three anonymous reviewers and the Editor (Dr. Feike A. Dijkstra) for their helpful comments and suggestions that greatly improved the manuscript.
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YW, FYL and WM designed the study. CZ, DW and WQ compiled the data. CZ produced the results and wrote the first draft with CS, BZ, YW and WM. All authors contributed to the development of the manuscript.
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Zhang, C., Song, C., Wang, D. et al. Precipitation and land use alter soil respiration in an Inner Mongolian grassland. Plant Soil 491, 101–114 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11104-022-05638-4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11104-022-05638-4