Vertical Distribution of Soil Organic Carbon Density in Relation to Land Use/Cover, Altitude and Slope Aspect in the Eastern Himalayas

Tshering Dorji, Inakwu O. A. Odeh and Damien J. Field
Additional contact information
Tshering Dorji: Department of Environmental Sciences, Faculty of Agriculture and Environment, The University of Sydney, Biomedical Building C81, 1 Central Avenue, Australian Technology Park, Sydney, NSW 2006, Australia
Inakwu O. A. Odeh: Department of Environmental Sciences, Faculty of Agriculture and Environment, The University of Sydney, Biomedical Building C81, 1 Central Avenue, Australian Technology Park, Sydney, NSW 2006, Australia
Damien J. Field: Department of Environmental Sciences, Faculty of Agriculture and Environment, The University of Sydney, Biomedical Building C81, 1 Central Avenue, Australian Technology Park, Sydney, NSW 2006, Australia

Land, 2014, vol. 3, issue 4, 1-19

Abstract: In-depth understanding about the vertical distribution of soil organic carbon (SOC) density is crucial for carbon (C) accounting, C budgeting and designing appropriate C sequestration strategies. We examined the vertical distribution of SOC density under different land use/land cover (LULC) types, altitudinal zones and aspect directions in a montane ecosystem of Bhutan. Sampling sites were located using conditioned Latin hypercube sampling (cLHS) scheme. Soils were sampled based on genetic horizons. An equal-area spline function was fitted to interpolate the target values to predetermined depths. Linear mixed model was fitted followed by mean separation tests. The results show some significant effects of LULC, altitudinal zone and slope aspect on the vertical distribution of SOC density in the profiles. Based on the proportion of mean SOC density in the first 20 cm relative to the cumulative mean SOC density in the top meter, the SOC density under agricultural lands (34%) was more homogeneously distributed down the profiles than forests (39%), grasslands (59%) and shrublands (43%). Similarly, the SOC density under 3500–4000 m zone (35%) was more uniformly distributed compared to 3000–3500 m zone (43%) and 1769–2500 m and 2500–3000 m zones (41% each). Under different aspect directions, the north and east-facing slopes (38% each) had more uniform distribution of SOC density than south (40%) and west-facing slopes (49%).

Keywords: SOC density; vertical distribution; land cover; altitude; slope aspect; Himalaya (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q15 Q2 Q24 Q28 Q5 R14 R52 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2014
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2073-445X/3/4/1232/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2073-445X/3/4/1232/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jlands:v:3:y:2014:i:4:p:1232-1250:d:41046

Access Statistics for this article

Land is currently edited by Ms. Carol Ma

More articles in Land from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().