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Effects of litter decomposition on soil nutrients in three broad-leaved forests.

CHEN Guo-ping1, CHENG Shan-shan1, CONG Ming-yang1, LIU Jing1, GAO Xin2, WANG Hui2, SHI Fu-chen1**   

  1. (1College of Life Sciences, Nankai University, Tianjin 300071, China; 2Tianjin Management Station of Wild Animal and Plant, Tianjin 300074, China)
  • Online:2014-04-10 Published:2014-04-10

Abstract: Nutrients in soils of Quercus variabilis forest, Juglans mandshurica forest and Q. aliena forest in Baxian Mountain National Nature Reserve in Tianjin were measured as affected by different litter layers: fresh litter, halfdecomposed litter and soils. The results showed that in the fresh litter, C content was highest in the Q. aliena forest (486.1 g·kg-1) and lowest in the Q. variabilis forest (447.5 g·kg-1), and N and P contents were highest in the J. mandshurica forest (17.9 and 1.2 g·kg-1) and lowest in the Q. aliena forest (13.2 and 0.8 g·kg-1). In the halfdecomposed litter, C and P contents were not significantly different among the three forests; N content was highest in the Q. aliena forest (17.1 g·kg-1) and lowest in the Q. variabilis forest (10.5 g·kg-1). The contents of C, N and P varied in the soils of the different forests: Q. aliena forest > J. mandshurica forest > Q. variabilis forest. In the fresh litter, C/N and C/P were significantly lower in J. mandshurica forest than in Q. aliena forest and Q. variabilis forest; in the halfdecomposed layer, C/N and C/P were not significantly different among the three forests. From the fresh layer to the halfdecomposed layer of litter, C/N and C/P were decreased by 17% and 11% in Q. variabilis forest, by 19% and 35% in Quercus aliena forest, but not significantly different in J. mandshurica forest. The mineral element content in the fresh litter tended to decrease from J. mandshurica forest, to Q. variabilis forest, and Q. aliena forest; pH increased with increasing the mineral element content. The order of total content of mineral element in the litter was Q. variabilis forest > Q. aliena forest > J. mandshurica forest.

Key words: Threshold-delay model, mixed plantation, sap flux density, rainfall pulses, environmental factor