Projected Changes in Soil Organic Carbon Stocks over a 50-Year Period under Different Grazing Management Systems in Semi-Arid Grasslands of Kenya
محورهای موضوعی : Carbon Capture and StorageHillary Rotich 1 , Richard Onwonga 2 , Oscar Koech 3 , Judith Mbau 4
1 - Department of land resource and Agricultural technology, University of Nairobi
2 - Faculty of Agriculture, University of Nairobi
3 - Land resource management and agricultural technology, faculty of agriculture, university of nairobi
4 - Land resource management and Agricultural technology, faculty of agriculture, university of Nairobi
کلید واژه: Rangelands, Grazing systems, RothC, SOC,
چکیده مقاله :
Rangeland cover approximately 85% of Kenya’s land mass and is a major resource for livestock farming with a considerable potential to mitigate climate change, yet these lands are stressed differently by various management. Our study aimed at predicting the long-term changes in Soil Organic Carbon (SOC) in grazing lands of Kenya under different grazing management systems (rotational, continuous and ungrazed), for a 50-year period using RothC 26.3. This research was conducted on a commercial grazing ranch which practices the two grazing management systems. Soil samples were collected at the depths of 0-10, 10-20 and 20-30 cm for the determination of soil organic carbon concentrations and bulk densities, results were later used for running the RothC model. The predicted results showed that the rate of SOC stock [t/ha] was higher under rotational grazing system in comparison to ungrazed and continual grazing system for the modelling period of 2015-2064. In the absence of grazing, the system was predicted to accumulate 19.22 Mg C ha-1 of SOC at the rate of 0.369 Mg C ha-1yr-1, whereas rotational grazing system was predicted to accumulate 30.46 Mg C ha-1 at the rate of 0.61 Mg C ha-1yr-1. The continual grazing management system resulted in the accrual of 18.49 Mg C ha-1 at the rate of 0.37 Mg C ha-1 yr-1 over 50 years. Thus, rotationally grazing management system have the potential of accumulating soil organic carbon in semi-arid grasslands.
Barger, N. N., Ojima, D. S., Belnap, J., Shiping, W., Yanfen, W., & Chen, Z., 2004. Changes in plant functional groups, litter quality, and soil carbon and nitrogen mineralization with sheep grazing in an Inner Mongolian grassland. Journal of Range Management, 57(6), 613-619.
Bayer, C., Mielniczuk, J., Martin-Neto, L., & Ernani, P. R., 2002. Stocks and humification degree of organic matter fractions as affected by no-tillage on a subtropical soil. Plant and Soil, 238(1), 133-140.
Blake, G. (1965). Bulk density. Methods of Soil Analysis. Part 1. Physical and Mineralogical Properties, Including Statistics of Measurement and Sampling(methodsofsoilana), 374-390.
Bolwig, S., Ponte, S., Du Toit, A., Riisgaard, L., & Halberg, N., 2010. Integrating poverty and environmental concerns into value‐chain analysis: a conceptual framework. Development Policy Review, 28(2), 173-194.
Coleman, K., Jenkinson, D., Crocker, G., Grace, P., Klir, J., Körschens, M., . . . Richter, D. 1997. Simulating trends in soil organic carbon in long-term experiments using RothC-26.3. Geoderma, 81(1-2), 29-44.
Coleman, K., & Jenkinson, D. 1996. RothC-26.3-A Model for the turnover of carbon in soil Evaluation of soil organic matter models (pp. 237-246): Springer.
Conant, R. T., Paustian, K., and Elliott, E. T. 2001. Grassland management and conversion into grassland: effects on soil carbon. Ecological Applications, 11(2), 343-355.
Curran Cournane, F. (2010). Impacts of livestock grazing on soil physical quality and phosphorus and suspended sediment losses in surface runoff. Lincoln University.
Evans, N., Avis, A., & Palmer, A. 1997. Changes to the vegetation of the mid‐Fish River valley, Eastern Cape, South Africa, in response to landuse, as revealed by a direct gradient analysis. African Journal of Range & Forage Science, 14(2), 68-74.
Falloon, P., & Smith, P. 2002. Simulating SOC changes in long‐term experiments with RothC and CENTURY: model evaluation for a regional scale application. Soil use and management, 18(2), 101-111.
Falloon et al, 1998. Estimating the size of inert organic matter pool from total soil organic carbon content for use the Rothamsted Carbon Model
FAO, 2009. State of food and agriculture.
Faostat, F. 2009. Statistical databases. Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Rome.
Farage, P., Ardö, J., Olsson, L., Rienzi, E., Ball, A., & Pretty, J. 2007. The potential for soil carbon sequestration in three tropical dryland farming systems of Africa and Latin America: A modelling approach. Soil and Tillage Research, 94(2), 457-472.
Favretto, N., Stringer, L., Dougill, A., Dallimer, M., Perkins, J., Reed, M., Mulale, K. 2016. Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis to identify dryland ecosystem service trade-offs under different rangeland land uses. Ecosystem Services, 17, 142-151.
Fearnside and Barbosa. 1998,Soil carbon changes from conversion of forest to pasture in Brazilian Amazonia
Galvin, K. A. (2009). Transitions: pastoralists living with change. Annual Review of Anthropology, 38, 185-198.
Garg, R., & Vyas, L. 1975. Litter production in deciduous forest near Udaipur (south Rajasthan), India Tropical ecological systems (pp. 131-135): Springer.
Green, R. A., & Detling, J. K. 2000. Defoliation‐induced enhancement of total aboveground nitrogen yield of grasses. Oikos, 91(2), 280-284.
Heitschmidt, R., Vermeire, L., & Grings, E. 2004. Is rangeland agriculture sustainable? Journal of Animal Science, 82(13_suppl), E138-E146.
IPCC(2006) Generic methodologies applicable to multiple landuse categories
Jenkinson, D. S., Adams, D., & Wild, A. 1991. Model Estimates of CO (2) Emissions from Soil in Response to Global Warming. Nature, 351(6324), 304.
Juma, N., Izaurralde, R., Robertson, J., & McGill, W. 1996. Crop yield and soil organic matter trends over 60 years in a Typic Cryoboralf at Breton, Alberta. Soil organic matter in temperate agroecosystems. Long-term experiments in North America. CRC Press, Boca Raton, FL. Crop yield and soil organic matter trends over, 60, 273-281.
Kamau, P. 2003. Forage diversity and impact of grazing management on rangeland ecosystems in Mbeere District, Kenya.
Kinyua, P. I., van Kooten, G. C., & Bulte, E. H. 2000. African wildlife policy: protecting wildlife herbivores on private game ranches. European Review of Agricultural Economics, 27(2), 227-244.
Kioko, J., Kiringe, J. W., & Seno, S. O. 2012. Impacts of livestock grazing on a savanna grassland in Kenya. Journal of Arid Land, 4(1), 29-35.
Kladivko, E. J. (2001). Tillage systems and soil ecology. Soil and Tillage Research, 61(1), 61-76.
Lemus, R. W., & Rivera, D. 2011. Pasture and Grazing Management Under Drought Conditions: Mississippi State University Extension Service.
Metera, E., Sakowski, T., Słoniewski, K., & Romanowicz, B. 2010. Grazing as a tool to maintain biodiversity of grassland-a review. Animal Science Papers and Reports, 28(4), 315-334.
Milchunas, D. G. 2006. Responses of plant communities to grazing in the southwestern United States.
Naeth, M. A., Pluth, D. J., Chanasyk, D. S., Bailey, A. W. and Fedkenheuer, A. W. 1990. Soil compacting impacts of grazing in mixed prairie and fescue grassland ecosystems of Alberta. Can. J. Soil Sci. 70: 157167.
Parton, W., Schimel, D. S., Cole, C., & Ojima, D. 1987. Analysis of factors controlling soil organic matter levels in Great Plains grasslands. Soil Science Society of America Journal, 51(5), 1173-1179.
Patra, D., Brookes, P., Coleman, K., & Jenkinson, D. 1990. Seasonal changes of soil microbial biomass in an arable and a grassland soil which have been under uniform management for many years. Soil Biology and Biochemistry, 22(6), 739-742.
Peltoniemi, M., Thurig, E., Ogle, S., Palosuo, T., Schrump, M., Wutzler, T., Mikhailov, A. 2007. Models in country scale carbon accounting of forest soils. Silva Fennica, 41(3), 575.
Poussart, P. F., Evans, M. N., & Schrag, D. P. 2004. Resolving seasonality in tropical trees: multi-decade, high-resolution oxygen and carbon isotope records from Indonesia and Thailand. Earth and Planetary Science Letters, 218(3), 301-316.
Rasmussen, P. E., Goulding, K. W., Brown, J. R., Grace, P. R., Janzen, H. H., & Körschens, M. 1998. Long-term agroecosystem experiments: assessing agricultural sustainability and global change. science, 282(5390), 893-896.
Richard A. Gill. 2007. Influence of 90 Years of Protection From Grazing on Plant and Soil Processes in the Subalpine of the Wasatch Plateau, USA," Rangeland Ecology and Management 60(1), 88-98, (1 January 2007). https://doi.org/10.2111/05-236R2.1
Six, J., Elliott, E., & Paustian, K. 1999. Aggregate and soil organic matter dynamics under conventional and no-tillage systems. Soil Science Society of America Journal, 63(5), 1350-1358.
Smith, P., Bhogal, A., Edgington, P., Black, H., Lilly, A., Barraclough, D., Merrington, G. 2010. Consequences of feasible future agricultural landuse change on soil organic carbon stocks and greenhouse gas emissions in Great Britain. Soil use and management, 26(4), 381-398.
Smith et al., 2005. Projected changes in mineral soil carbon of European croplands and grasslands, 1990–2080
Snyman, H., & Du Preez, C. 2005. Rangeland degradation in a semi-arid South Africa—II: influence on soil quality. Journal of Arid Environments, 60(3), 483-507.
Tom, N., Raman, A., Hodgkins, D. S., & Nicol, H. 2006. Populations of soil organisms under continuous set stocked and high intensity short duration rotational grazing practices in the central tablelands of New South Wales (Australia). New Zealand Journal of Agricultural Research, 49(3), 261-272.
Tuffour, H. O., Bonsu, M., & Khalid, A. A. 2014. Assessment of soil degradation due to compaction resulting from cattle grazing using infiltration parameters. IJSRES, 2, 139-149.
Wang, G., Huang, Y., Wang, E., Yu, Y., & Zhang, W. 2013. Modeling soil organic carbon change across Australian wheat growing areas, 1960–2010. PloS one, 8(5), e63324.
Wang, Q., & Batkhishig, O. 2014. Impact of overgrazing on semiarid ecosystem soil properties: A Case study of the Eastern Hovsgol Lake Area, Mongolia. Journal of Ecosystem & Ecography, 4(1), 1.
Welker, J. M., Fahnestock, J. T., Povirk, K. L., Bilbrough, C. J., & Piper, R. E. 2004. Alpine grassland CO2 exchange and nitrogen cycling: grazing history effects, Medicine Bow Range, Wyoming, USA. Arctic, antarctic, and alpine research, 36(1), 11-20.
Wolf, K. 2011. Effects of High-Density, Short-Duration Planned Livestock Grazing on Soil Carbon Sequestration Potentials in a Coastal California Mixed Grassland. California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo.
Wu, G.-L., Liu, Z.-H., Zhang, L., Chen, J.-M., & Hu, T.M. 2010. Long-term fencing improved soil properties and soil organic carbon storage in an alpine swamp meadow of western China. Plant and Soil, 332(1-2), 331-337.
Yu, S., & Yao, H. 2003. Simulation and prediction of soil organic carbon dynamics in Jiangsu province based on models and GIS techniques. Scientia Agriculatura Sinica, 2, 1007-1013.
