Abstract: Soil moisture is one of the most important factors influencing soil respiration. Rainfall plays an important role in disturbing soil moisture. Thus, studying the relationship between rainfall and soil respiration will contribute to understanding the mechanism of soil respiration. In this paper, soil respiration (R_s) and ecosystem respiration (R_e) in a subalpine meadow in the Tianlaochi catchment in the Qilian Mountains, Qinghai before and after rainfall were observed using a LI-8100 automatic instrument (LI-COR, Inc., NE, USA) in natural and artificial rainfall experiments. The results showed that R_s and R_e decreased by 66.87% and 9.88% after shortterm rainfall (rainfall duration was less than 1 h), respectively. Continuous rainfall had a negative effect on respiration rate in several hours after the rainfall, but promoted respiration rate the next day and later; R_e and R_s increased 1-2 folds respectively compared with the values before rainfall. The intensity of inhibition effects of rainfall duration and rainfall amount on respiration rate increased with the increase of the rainfall duration and rainfall amount, but it would become weaker when the duration was over 60 min or the amount was over 30 mm. A small amount of precipitation would stimulate respiration rate significantly. For example, R_s and R_e were increased by 1.81% and 41.65%, respectively when the precipitation was 0.2 mm.

Key words: land use type, soil organic carbon, soil total nitrogen., urban wetland