Publication Date:
2020-09-01
Description:
Salt marshes provide various ecosystem functions and services including flooding protection, wildlife habitats,
and carbon storage. These functions and services could, however, be strongly impacted by anthropogenic activities
such as livestock grazing – a common practice in the Wadden Sea salt marshes located in North of Germany.
To assess the impact of grazing on soil parameters, a total number of eight soil cores (⌀: 18 cm; L: 50 cm) were
collected in areas with and without livestock grazing, and scanned using a Computed Tomography (CT) to characterize
soil parameters including soil macroporosity, sediment density, and pores connectivity. Subsequently,
sub-samples were taken for determination of soil moisture content (%) and bulk density (g cm−3). To account for
the impact of grazing on soil drainage after tidal inundations, water table relative to soil surface was monitored
during two flooding events. Our results demonstrated that grazed salt marsh has higher top-soil bulk density, and
lower macroporosity and pore connectivity, than ungrazed marsh, due to soil compaction by livestock grazing.
Moreover, grazed marsh has slower water drainage and that might keep the soil waterlogged for a longer period
of time which has implications on lowering decomposition rate due to lower soil redox. This study provides evidence
that grazing alters physical soil parameters in salt marsh. Consequently, grazing needs to be accounted for
when evaluating how land use impacts ecosystem services and functions including carbon sequestration.
Repository Name:
EPIC Alfred Wegener Institut
Type:
Article
,
peerRev
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