Sediment deposition from eroding peatlands alters headwater invertebrate biodiversity.

Land use and climate change are driving widespread modifications to the biodiverse and functionally unique headwaters of rivers. In temperate and boreal regions, many headwaters drain peatlands where land management and climate change can cause significant soil erosion and peat deposition in rivers. However, effects of peat deposition in river ecosystems remain poorly understood.

Soil organic carbon stock in grasslands: Effects of inorganic fertilizers, liming and grazing in different climate settings.

Grasslands store about 34% of the global terrestrial carbon (C) and are vital for the provision of various ecosystem services such as forage and climate regulation. About 89% of this grassland C is stored in the soil and is affected by management activities but the effects of these management activities on C storage under different climate settings are not known. In this study, we synthesized the effects of fertilizer (nitrogen and phosphorus) application, liming and grazing regime on the stock of SOC in global grasslands, under different site specific climatic settings using a meta-analysis of 341 datasets.

Negative effects of climate change on upland grassland productivity and carbon fluxes are not attenuated by nitrogen status.

Effects of climate change on managed grassland carbon (C) fluxes and biomass production are not well understood. In this study, we investigated the individual and interactive effects of experimental warming (+3 °C above ambient summer daily range of 9-12 °C), supplemental precipitation (333 mm +15%) and drought (333 mm -23%) on plant biomass, microbial biomass C (MBC), net ecosystem exchange (NEE) and dissolved organic C (DOC) flux in soil cores from two upland grasslands of different soil nitrogen (N) status (0.54% and 0.

Impacts of peat bulk density, ash deposition and rainwater chemistry on establishment of peatland mosses.

Background And Aims: Peatland moss communities play an important role in ecosystem function. Drivers such as fire and atmospheric pollution have the capacity to influence mosses via multiple pathways. Here, we investigate physical and chemical processes which may influence establishment and growth of three key moss species in peatlands.

Vegetation management with fire modifies peatland soil thermal regime.

Vegetation removal with fire can alter the thermal regime of the land surface, leading to significant changes in biogeochemistry (e.g. carbon cycling) and soil hydrology.

River ecosystem response to prescribed vegetation burning on Blanket Peatland.

Catchment-scale land-use change is recognised as a major threat to aquatic biodiversity and ecosystem functioning globally. In the UK uplands rotational vegetation burning is practised widely to boost production of recreational game birds, and while some recent studies have suggested burning can alter river water quality there has been minimal attention paid to effects on aquatic biota. We studied ten rivers across the north of England between March 2010 and October 2011, five of which drained burned catchments and five from unburned catchments.

The effect of broadleaf woodland on aluminium speciation in stream water in an acid-sensitive area in the UK.

Acidification can result in the mobilisation and release of toxic inorganic monomeric aluminium (Al) species from soils into aquatic ecosystems. Although it is well-established that conifer trees enhance acidic atmospheric deposition and exacerbate soil and water acidification, the effect of broad-leaved woodland on soil and water acidification is less clear. This study investigated the effect of broadleaf woodland cover on the acid-base chemistry and Al species present in stream water, and processes controlling these in the acid-sensitive area around Loch Katrine, in the central Highlands, Scotland, UK, where broadleaf woodland expansion is occurring.

Increased belowground biomass and soil CO2 fluxes after a decade of carbon dioxide enrichment in a warm-temperate forest.

Atmospheric CO2 concentrations have risen 40% since the start of the industrial revolution. Beginning in 1996, the Duke Free-Air CO2 Enrichment experiment has exposed plots in a loblolly pine forest to an additional 200 microL/L CO2 compared to trees growing in ambient CO2. This paper presents new belowground data and a synthesis of results through 2008, including root biomass and nutrient concentrations, soil respiration rates, soil pore-space CO2 concentrations, and soil-solution chemistry to 2 m depth.

Acidic deposition: decline in mobilization of toxic aluminium.

The mobilization of aluminium from acidic forest soils is arguably the most ecologically important consequence of acid deposition in the environment because of its adverse effects on soils, forest vegetation and surface water. Here we show that there has been a significant decline in the concentrations of aluminium species in soil solutions at medium-to-high elevations in a northern hardwood forest in the United States in response to decreasing acidic deposition. Streamwater aluminium concentrations have also fallen and, if this rate of recovery persists, will within 10 years no longer pose a threat to fish.