Soil Nutrients, Enzyme Activities, and Microbial Communities along a Chronosequence of Chinese Fir Plantations in Subtropical China

Forests undergo a long-term development process from young to mature stages, yet the variations in soil nutrients, enzyme activities, microbial diversity, and community composition related forest ages are still unclear. In this study, characteristics of bacterial fungal communities with their corresponding environmental factors young, middle, stages (7, 15, 25-year-old) Chinese fir plantations (CFP) subtropical region China were investigated 2021. Results showed that alpha diversity indices (Chao1 Shannon) bacteria fungi higher 15 25-year-old stands than 7-year-old stand CFP, while pH, water content, organic carbon, total nitrogen, phosphorus, sucrase, urease, acid phosphatase, catalase, biomass phosphorus other two CFP. The nonmetric multidimensional scaling analysis revealed species was significantly different three redundancy canonical correspondence indicated urease nitrogen main affecting composition. Our findings suggested structure inconsistent changes nutrients activities during CFP development, enhancing nurturing nutrient accumulation mid-development stage beneficial sustainable management