Understory vegetation plays the key role in sustaining soil   microbial biomass and extracellular enzyme activities

Yang, Yang; Zhang, Xinyu; Zhang, Chuang; Wang, Huimin; Fu, Xiaoli; Chen, Fusheng; Wan, Songze; Sun, Xiaomin; Wen, Xuefa; Wang, Jifu

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-15-4481-2018

Articles | Volume 15, issue 14

https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-15-4481-2018

© Author(s) 2018. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-15-4481-2018

© Author(s) 2018. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 15, issue 14

Research article

|

24 Jul 2018

Research article |

| 24 Jul 2018

Understory vegetation plays the key role in sustaining soil microbial biomass and extracellular enzyme activities

Yang Yang, Xinyu Zhang, Chuang Zhang, Huimin Wang, Xiaoli Fu, Fusheng Chen, Songze Wan, Xiaomin Sun, Xuefa Wen, and Jifu Wang

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Final revised paper (published on 24 Jul 2018)
Preprint (discussion started on 16 Jan 2018)

Interactive discussion

Status: closed

AC: Author comment | RC: Referee comment | SC: Short comment | EC: Editor comment

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- Supplement

RC1: 'bg 2017 545', Anonymous Referee #1, 29 Jan 2018
- AC1: 'Response to Anonymous Referee #1', Yang Yang, 15 Mar 2018
RC2: 'bg 2017 545', Anonymous Referee #2, 27 Feb 2018
- AC2: 'Response to Anonymous Referee #2', Yang Yang, 15 Mar 2018

Peer-review completion

AR: Author's response | RR: Referee report | ED: Editor decision

ED: Reconsider after major revisions (19 Mar 2018) by Anja Rammig

AR by Svenja Lange on behalf of the Authors (26 Mar 2018) Author's response

ED: Referee Nomination & Report Request started (05 Apr 2018) by Anja Rammig

RR by Anonymous Referee #1 (16 Apr 2018)

RR by Anonymous Referee #3 (22 Apr 2018)

RR by Anonymous Referee #2 (24 Apr 2018)

ED: Reconsider after major revisions (08 May 2018) by Anja Rammig

AR by Yang Yang on behalf of the Authors (10 Jun 2018) Author's response Manuscript

ED: Referee Nomination & Report Request started (11 Jun 2018) by Anja Rammig

RR by Anonymous Referee #2 (05 Jul 2018)

ED: Publish subject to technical corrections (10 Jul 2018) by Anja Rammig

AR by Yang Yang on behalf of the Authors (12 Jul 2018) Author's response Manuscript

Short summary

In this study, we established a long-term field experiment to assess how the soil abiotic properties, PLFAs, and enzyme activities in a Chinese fir plantation changed when the understory vegetation was removed. We found that understory vegetation plays a key role in sustaining soil carbon content, microbial biomass, and extracellular enzyme activities. We therefore proposed that, to sustain soil quality in subtropical Chinese fir plantations, understory vegetation should be maintained.