Grassland management impacts on soil carbon stocks: a new synthesis

Abstract Grassland ecosystems cover a large portion of Earths’ surface and contain substantial amounts of soil organic carbon. Previous work has established that these soil carbon stocks are sensitive to management and land use changes: grazing, species composition, and mineral nutrient availability can lead to losses or gains of soil carbon. Because of the large annual carbon fluxes into and out of grassland systems, there has been growing interest in how changes in management might shift the net balance of these flows, stemming losses from degrading grasslands or managing systems to increase soil carbon stocks (i.e., carbon sequestration). A synthesis published in 2001 assembled data from hundreds of studies…

• NS
  National Science Foundation

  Award: 0842315
• UE
  U.S. Environmental Protection Agency

  Award: EPA‐OAR‐CCD‐09‐07
• UD
  U.S. Department of Agriculture
• IL
  International Livestock Research Institute