Abstract
We aim to understand the distribution of soil moisture and its controlling factors for regional vegetation restoration in a semi-arid sandy land. The top 500 cm soils of the main introduced vegetation types restored for different years in Chinese Mu Us Sandy Land were collected, and the soil moisture and influencing factors were analyzed. The results demonstrated that the total soil water storage decreased in a sequence of shrub land (S) ˃ arbor land (A) ˃ shifting sandy land (CK) ˃ grassland (G). With the increase of restoration period, the soil moisture increased in arbor land and decreased first and then increased in both shrub land and grassland. Soil moisture was negatively correlated (P < 0.05) with root length density (RLD) in G56, S36, A21, and S21. RLD and soil moisture in S56 showed an extremely significant negative correlation (P < 0.01). Soil water content had a positive correlation with silt content (P < 0.05) but demonstrated a negative correlation with the sand content (P < 0.05) in A56. Both silt and sand contents showed negative correlations with soil moisture in G56 (P < 0.05). In summary, vegetation type, restoration period, RLD, and silt and clay contents have significant effects on soil moisture. To improve the soil moisture status, arbors and bushes should be preferentially considered for vegetation restoration in semi-arid northwest of China.
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Abbreviations
- Axy :
-
Arbors restored for xy years
- Sxy :
-
Shrubs restored for xy years
- Gxy :
-
Grassland restored for xy years
- RLD:
-
Root length density
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Acknowledgments
Sincere thanks are given to Brenton S. Sharratt (retired) from USDA-ARS and Markus Flury from Washington State University for revising the manuscript.
Funding
This work was funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 41877541 and 41471222) and the Special Project for Young Talent of the Institute of Soil and Water Conversation, CAS.
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Wang, L., Ma, A., Zhang, H. et al. Effects of Long-Term Vegetation Restoration on Distribution of Deep Soil Moisture in Semi-arid Northwest of China. J Soil Sci Plant Nutr 20, 2123–2132 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s42729-020-00280-4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s42729-020-00280-4