BACKGROUND Large spatial, seasonal and annual variability of major drivers of the carbon cycle (precipitation, temperature, fire regime and nutrient availability) are common in the Sahel region. This causes large variability in net ecosystem exchange and in vegetation productivity, the subsistence basis for a major part of the rural population in Sahel. This study compares the 2005 dry and wet ...

the performance of new forage brassica plants were studied in ilam, iran, during 2012-2014 in a field experiment using a randomized complete block design with four replications. the treatments included, different forage crops perko, buko, oilseed radish, berseem clover, and the combination of three plants ramtil, phaselia, and clover. the studied traits consisted of plant height, forage yield, ...

[1] Characterization of the space-time variability of soil moisture is important for land surface and climate studies. Here we develop an analytical model to investigate how, at the dry-end of the soil moisture range, the main characteristics of the soil moisture field (spatial mean and variability, steady state distribution) depend on the intermittent character of low intensity rain storms. Ou...

Phosphomonoesterase activities were determined monthly during a seasonal cycle in three characteristic soil types of the English uplands that have been subject to long-term atmospheric nitrogen deposition. Activities (micromol para-nitrophenol g(-1) soil dry wt. h(-1)) ranged between 83.9 and 307 in a blanket peat (total carbon 318 mg g(-1). pH 3.9), 45.2-86.4 in an acid organic grassland soil ...

Over three million hectares of salt-affected soils characterized with high salinity and sodicity caused serious land degradation in Songnen Plain, northeast China. Soil salinity–sodicity heterogeneous distribution under microtopography is usually influenced by several environmental factors. The side direction movement of soil water driven by water from depression is the key factor that aggravat...

introduction: among soil species earthworms are ubiquitous, abundant and important for soil processes, constituting the largest terrestrial faunal biomass and are also impacted by soil pollutants. the primary purpose of this study was to determine whether changes in earthworm biomass and behavior could serve as a good indicator for copper toxicity in soil systems. another aim of the study was t...