Skip to main content

Advertisement

SpringerLink
Log in

Spatial variability and potential controls of soil organic matter in the Eastern Dongting Lake Plain in southern China

  • Soils, Sec 1 • Soil Organic Matter Dynamics and Nutrient Cycling • Research Article
  • Published:
Journal of Soils and Sediments Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Purpose

Information related to spatial distribution and dominants of soil organic matter (SOM) is critical for evaluating soil quality and assessing the carbon sequestration capacity, which play essential role in soil management and climate change mitigation. Until now, no reported research has conducted an extensive survey to predict SOM content, analysed SOM spatial variability, and determined the main controls of SOM variation in areas around Dongting Lake in southern China. Therefore, this study aims to (1) explore the spatial variability of SOM content; (2) build a model to quantitatively predict SOM content with various sources of covariates and with the RF method; and (3) identify potential controls of SOM based on the relative importance of variables.

Materials and methods

A total of 8040 soil samples were collected from Yueyang County in Eastern Dongting Lake Plain. Ordinary kriging was used to produce a map of SOM and then the random forest algorithms were used to predict SOM content with 17 covariates covered terrain attributes, land use, climate, soil management policies, soil properties, and geologic information. Finally, the main dominants of SOM variability were identified.

Results and discussion

The SOM content in the survey region varied from 4.00 to 446.60 g kg−1 and had an average content of 33.17 g kg−1, which indicated fertile soil in the study area. SOM presented strong spatial variability in the area under study. The high SOM values were majorly located in the northeast and southwest parts of the survey regions. The R2 of our developed model was 0.74 and the RMSE was 0.16 g kg−1. The main controls of SOM variability in the study area were available phosphorus, precipitation, soil group, rotation system, available potassium, altitude, and slope.

Conclusion

Our developed model showed a good performance to estimate SOM content using auxiliary variables. Soil properties and agricultural management measures played the most important roles in predicting SOM in the study area. Results obtained from this study could provide new insights for estimating SOM and contribute to the sustainable development of agriculture and better regulation of soil quality in the study area.

Graphical abstract

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4
Fig. 5
Fig. 6
Fig. 7
Fig. 8
Fig. 9
Fig. 10

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Alcántara V, Don A, Well R, Nieder R (2016) Deep ploughing increases agricultural soil organic matter stocks. Glob Chang Biol 22(8):2939–2956

    Google Scholar 

  • Bai YX, Zhou YC (2020) The main factors controlling spatial variability of soil organic carbon in a small karst watershed, Guizhou Province, China. Geoderma. 357:113938

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Baritz R, Seufert G, Montanarella L, Van Ranst E (2010) Carbon concentrations and stocks in forest soils of Europe. For Ecol Manag 260:262–277

    Google Scholar 

  • Barthold FK, Stallard RF, Elsenbeer H (2008) Soil nutrient-landscape relationships in a lowland tropical rainforest in Panama. For Ecol Manag 255:1135–1148

    Google Scholar 

  • Bayer C, Mielniczuk J, Martin-Neto L, Ernani PR (2002) Stocks and humification degree of organic matter fractions as affected by no-tillage on a subtropical soil. Plant Soil 238(1):133–140

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Bogunovic I, Trevisani S, Pereira P, Vukadinovic (2018) Mapping soil organic matter in the Baranja region (Croatia): Geological and anthropic forcing parameters. Sci The Total Environ 643:335–345

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Boubehziz S, Khanchoul K, Benslama M, Benslama A, Marchetti A, Francaviglia R, Piccini C (2020) Predictive mapping of soil organic carbon in Northeast Algeria. Catena. 190:104539

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Breiman L (2001) Random forests. Mach Learn 45(1):5–32

    Google Scholar 

  • Chabala LM, Mulolwa A, Lungu O (2017) Application of ordinary kriging in mapping soil organic carbon in Zambia. Pedosphere. 27(2):338–343

    Google Scholar 

  • Cambardella CA, Moorman TB, Novak JM, Parkin TB, Karlen DL, Turco RF, Konopka AE (1994) Field-scale variability of soil properties in central Iowa soils. Soil Sci Soc Am J 58(5):1501–1511

    Google Scholar 

  • Cambou A, Saby NPA, Hunault G, Nold F, Cannavo P, Schwartz C, Vidal-Beaudet L (2021) Impact of city historical management on soil organic carbon stocks in Paris (France). J Soils Sediments:1–15

  • Caubet M, Dobarco MR, Arrouays D, Minasny B, Saby NPA (2019) Merging country, continental and global predictions of soil texture: Lessons from ensemble modelling in France. Geoderma. 337:99–110

    Google Scholar 

  • Chen SC, Liang ZZ, Webster R, Zhang GL, Zhou Y, Teng HF, Hu BF, Arrouays A, Shi Z (2019) A high-resolution map of soil pH in China made by hybrid modelling of sparse soil data and environmental covariates and its implications for pollution. Sci Total Environ 655:273–283

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Chen, S.C., Xu, D.Y., Li, S., Ji, W.J., Yang, M.H., Zhou, Y., Hu, B.F., Xu,H.Y., Shi, Z. 2020. Monitoring soil organic carbon in alpine soils using in situ vis-NIR spectroscopy and a multilayer perceptron. Land Degrad Dev, 1-13. doi:https://doi.org/10.1002/ldr.3497, 31

  • Conant RTMG, Ryan GI, Agren HE et al (2011) Temperature and soil organic matter decomposition rates - synthesis of current knowledge and a way forward. Glob Chang Biol 17:3392–3404

    Google Scholar 

  • Costa JF (2003) Reducing the impact of outliers in ore reserves estimation. Math Geol 35(3):323–345

    Google Scholar 

  • Dai FQ, Zhou QG, Lv ZQ, Wang XM, Liu GC (2014) Spatial prediction of soil organic matter content integrating artificial neural network and ordinary kriging in Tibetan Plateau. Ecol Indic 45:184–194

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Davidson EA, Janssens IA (2006) Temperature sensitivity of soil carbon decomposition and feedbacks to climate change. Nature. 440(7081):165–173

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Debicka M, Kocowicz A, Weber J, Jamroz E (2016) Organic matter effects on phosphorus sorption in sandy soils. Arch Agron Soil Sci 62(6):840–855

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Dieleman WIJ, Venter M, Ramachandra A (2013) Soil carbon stocks vary predictably with altitude in tropical forest: implications for soil carbon storage. Geoderma. 204–205:59–67

    Google Scholar 

  • Don A, Scholten T, Schulze E-D (2009) Conversion of cropland into grassland: implications for soil organic carbon stocks in two soils with different texture. J Plant Nutr Soil Sci 172:53–62

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Fang C, Smith P, Moncrieff JB, Smith JU (2005) Similar response of labile and resistant soil organic matter pools to changes in temperature. Nature. 433(7021):57–59

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Fan MM, Lal R, Zhang H, Margenot AJ, Wu JT, Wu PB, Zhang LM, Yao JT, Chen FR, Gao C (2020) Variability and determinants of soil organic matter under different land uses and soil types in eastern China. Soil Tillage Res 198:104544

    Google Scholar 

  • Faurescu I, Varlam C, Stefanescu I, Cuna S, Vagner I, Faurescu D, Bogdan D (2010) Direct absorption method and liquid scintillation counting for radiocarbon measurements in organic carbon from sediments. Radiocarbon. 52(2):794–799

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Fu TT, Zhao RY, Hu BF, Jia XL, Wang ZG, Zhou LQ, Huang MX, Li Y, Shi Z (2020) Novel framework for modelling the cadmium balance and accumulation in farmland soil in Zhejiang Province, East China: sensitivity analysis, parameter optimisation, and forecast for 2050. J Clean Prod 279:123674

    Google Scholar 

  • Girardin CAJ, Malhi Y, Aragão LEOC, Mamani M, Huaraca Huasco W, Durand L, Feeley KJ, Rapp J, Silva-Espejo JE, Silman M, Salinas N, Whittaker RJ (2010) Net primary productivity allocation and cycling of carbon along a tropical forest elevational transect in the Peruvian Andes. Glob Chang Biol 16(12):3176–3192

    Google Scholar 

  • Goovaerts P (1997) Geostatistics for Natural Resources Evaluation. Oxford University Press, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Götze P, Rücknagel J, Jacobs A, Märländer B, Koch H, Holzweißig B, Steinz M, Christen O (2016) Sugar beet rotation effects on soil organic matter and calculated humus balance in Central Germany. Eur J Agron 76:198–207

    Google Scholar 

  • Guggenberger G, Christensen BT, Zech W (1994) Land-use effects on the composition of organic matter in particle-size separates of soil: I. Lignin and carbohydrate signature. Eur J Soil Sci 45(4):449–458

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Guo PT, Li MF, Luo W, Tang QF, Liu ZW, Lin ZM (2015) Digital mapping of soil organic matter for rubber plantation at regional scale: An application of random forest plus residuals kriging approach. Geoderma. 237:49–59

    Google Scholar 

  • Hartley IP, Ineson P (2008) Substrate quality and the temperature sensitivity of soil organic matter decomposition. Soil Biol Biochem 40:1567–1574

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Havlin JL, Kissel DE, Maddux LD, Claassen MM, Long JH (1990) Crop rotation and tillage effects on soil organic carbon and nitrogen. Soil Sci Soc Am J 54(2):448–452

    Google Scholar 

  • He YT, He XH, Xu MG, Zhang WJ, Yang XY, Huang SM (2018) Long-term fertilization increases soil organic carbon and alters its chemical composition in three wheat-maize cropping sites across central and south China. Soil Tillage Res 177:79–87

    Google Scholar 

  • Hengl T (2009) A Practical Guide to Geostatistical Mapping, 2nd edn. University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam

    Google Scholar 

  • Hengl T, de Jesus JM, Heuvelink GBM et al (2017) SoilGrids250m: Global gridded soil information based on machine learning. PLoS One 12(2):e0169748

    Google Scholar 

  • Hu BF, Shao S, Fu ZY, Li Y, Ni H, Chen SC, Zhou Y, Jin B, Shi Z (2019) Identifying heavy metal pollution hot spots in soil-rice systems: A case study in South of Yangtze River Delta, China. Sci Total Environ 658:614–625

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Hu BF, Zhou Y, Jiang YF, Ji WJ, Fu ZY, Shao S, Li S, Huang MX, Zhou LQ, Shi Z (2020a) Spatio-temporal variation and source changes of potentially toxic elements in soil on a typical plain of the Yangtze River Delta, China (2002–2012). J Environ Manag 271:110943

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Hu BF, Bourennane H, Arrouays D, Denoroy P, Lemercier B, Saby NPA (2020b) Developing pedotransfer functions to harmonize extractable soil phosphorus content measured with different methods: A case study across the mainland of France. Geoderma. 381:114645

    Google Scholar 

  • Hu BF, Xue J, Zhou Y, Shao S, Fu ZY, Li Y, Chen SC, Qi L, Shi Z (2020c) Modelling bioaccumulation of heavy metals in soil-crop ecosystems and identifying its controlling factors using machine learning. Environ Pollut 262:114308

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Hu PL, Liu SJ, Ye YY, Zhang W, Wang KL, Su YR (2018) Effects of environmental factors on soil organic carbon under natural or managed vegetation restoration. Land Degrad Dev 29:387–397. https://doi.org/10.1002/ldr.2876

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hu W, Shen Q, Zhai X, Du S, Zhang X (2021) Impact of environmental factors on the spatiotemporal variability of soil organic matter: a case study in a typical small Mollisol watershed of Northeast China. J Soils Sediments 1-12

  • Huang X, Tang H, Kang W, Yu GH, Ran W, Hong JP, Shen QR (2018) Redox interfaceassociated organo-mineral interactions: a mechanism for C sequestration under a rice-wheat cropping system. Soil Biol Biochem 120:12–23. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.soilbio.2018.01.031

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Jenkinson DS, Rayner JH (1977) The turnover of soil organic matter in some of the Rothamsted Classical Experiments. Soil Sci 123:298–305

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Ji WJ, Shi Z, Zhou Q, Zhou LQ (2012) Investigation on several different types of soils and spectral characteristic bands of its organic matter with Visible Near-Infrared Diffuse Reflectance Spectroscopy. J Infrared Millim W 31(3):277–282

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Jia XL, Fu TT, Hu BF, Shi Z, Zhou LQ, Zhu YW (2020) Identification of the potential risk areas for soil heavy metal pollution based on the source-sink theory. J Hazard Mater 393:122424

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Kirschbaum MUF (1995) The temperature dependence of soil organic matter decomposition, and the effect of global warming on soil organic C storage. Soil Biol Biochem 27:753–760

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Leifeld J, Bassin S, Fuhrer J (2005) Carbon stocks in Swiss agricultural soils predicted by land-use, soil characteristics, and altitude. Agric Ecosyst Environ 105(1):255–266. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.agee.2004.03.006

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Lesoing GW, Doran JW (2019) Crop rotation, manure, and agricultural chemical effects on dryland crop yield and SOM over 16 years in eastern Nebraska. Soil Organ Matt Temperate Agroecosyst Long Term Experiments in North America 197

  • Liang ZZ, Chen SC, Yang YY, Zhao RY, Shi Z, Viscarra RRA (2019) National digital soil map of organic matter in topsoil and its associated uncertainty in 1980's China. Geoderma. 335:47–56

    Google Scholar 

  • Liaw A, Wiener M (2002) Classification and regression by randomForest. R News 2(3):18–22

    Google Scholar 

  • Liu SJ, Zhang W, Wang KL (2015) Factors controlling accumulation of soil organic carbon along vegetation succession in a typical karst region in Southwest China. Sci Total Environ 521:52–58

    Google Scholar 

  • Liu ZP, Shao MA, Wang YQ (2011) Effect of environmental factors on regional soil organic carbon stocks across the Loess Plateau region, China. Agric Ecosyst Environ 142:184–194

    Google Scholar 

  • Mao Y, Sang S, Liu S, Jia J (2014) Spatial distribution of pH and organic matter in urban soils and its implications on site-specific land uses in Xuzhou, China. CR Biol 337(5):332–337

    Google Scholar 

  • Marchetti A, Piccini C, Francaviglia R, Mabit L (2012) Spatial distribution of soil organic matter using geostatistics: A key indicator to assess soil degradation status in central Italy. Pedosphere. 22(2):230–242

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • McBratney AB, Mendonça Santos ML, Minasny B (2003) On digital soil mapping. Geoderma 117(1–2):3–52

  • Medhioub, E., Bouaziz, M., Bouaziz, S., 2019. Spatial Estimation of Soil Organic Matter Content Using Remote Sensing Data in Southern Tunisia. Advances in Remote Sensing and Geo Informatics Applications. Springer, Cham. 215-217.

  • Mirzaee S, Ghorbani-Dashtaki S, Mohammadi J, Asadzadeh (2016) Spatial variability of soil organic matter using remote sensing data. Catena. 145:118–127

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Nan YF, Guo SL, Zhang YJ, Li JC, Zhou XG, Li Z, Zhang F, Zou JL (2012) Effects of slope aspect and position on soil organic carbon and nitrogen of terraces in small watershed. Plant Nutrit. Fertilizer Sci 18:595–601

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Nianpeng H, Ruomeng W, Yang G, Jingzhong D, Xuefa W, Guirui Y (2013) Changes in the temperature sensitivity of SOM decomposition with grassland succession: implications for soil C sequestration. Ecol Evol 3(15):5045–5054

    Google Scholar 

  • Peng J, Biswas A, Jiang QS, Zhao RY, Hu J, Hu BF, Shi Z (2019) Estimating soil salinity from remote sensing and terrain data in southern Xinjiang Province, China. Geoderma. 337:1309–1319

    Google Scholar 

  • Piccini C, Marchetti A, Francaviglia R (2014) Estimation of soil organic matter by geostatistical methods: Use of auxiliary information in agricultural and environmental assessment. Ecol Indic 36:301–314

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Pittelkow CM, Liang XQ, Linquist BA, Van Groenigen KJ, Lee J, Lundy ME, Van Gestel N, Six J, Venterea RT, Van Kessel C (2015) Productivity limitsand potentials of the principles of conservation agriculture. Nature 517(7534):365-U482

    Google Scholar 

  • Prasad AM, Iverson LR, Liaw A (2006) Newer classification and regression tree techniques: bagging and random forest for ecological prediction. Ecosystems. 9:181–199

    Google Scholar 

  • Qiao PW, Lei M, Yang SC, Yang J, Guo GH, Zhou XY (2018) Comparing ordinary kriging and inverse distance weighting for soil as pollution in Beijing. Environ Sci Pollut Res 25(16):15597–15608

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Raich JW, Russel AE, Kanehiro K, Parton WJ, Vitousek PM (2006) Temperature influences carbon accumulation in moist tropical forests. Ecology. 87(1):76–87

    Google Scholar 

  • Robertson GP (1998) GS+: geostatistics for the environmental sciences: GS+ user's guide.

  • Rouse J, Hass R, Schell J (1974) Monitoring vegetation systems in the Great Plains with ERTS. In: Franden S, Marcanti E, Becker M (eds) Third ERTS-1 Symposium, Washington D.C., pp 309–317

  • R Development Core Team (2013) R: A Language and Environment for Statistical Computing.

  • Saby, N.P.A., Opitz, T., Hu, B.F., Lemercier, B., Bourennane, H., 2020. Bayesian uncertainty quantification of spatio-temporal trends in soil organic carbon using INLA and SPDE. In EGU General Assembly Conference Abstracts (p. 9154).

  • Schillaci C, Acutis M, Lombardo L, Lipani A, Fantappie M, Märker M, Saia S (2017) Spatio-temporal topsoil organic carbon mapping of a semi-arid Mediterranean region: The role of land use, soil texture, topographic indices and the influence of remote sensing data to modelling. Sci Total Environ 601:821–832

    Google Scholar 

  • Schimel DS, Braswell BH, Holland EA, Mckeown R, Ojima DS, Painter TH, Parton WJ, Townsend AR (1994) Climatic, edaphic, and biotic controls over storage and turnover of carbon in soils. Glob Biogeochem Cy 8:279–293

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Schmidt MWI, Torn MS, Abiven S, Dittmar T, Guggenberger G, Janssens IA, Kleber M, Kögel-Knabner I, Lehmann J, Manning DAC, Nannipieri P, Rasse DP, Weiner S, Trumbore SE (2011) Persistence of soil organic matter as an ecosystem property. Nature. 478(7367):49–56

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Shakoor A, Shahbaz M, Farooq TH, Sahar NE, Shahzad SM, Altaf MM, Ashraf M (2020) A global meta-analysis of greenhouse gases emission and crop yield under no-tillage as compared to conservation tillage. Sci Total Environ 142299

  • Simbahan GC, Dobermann A, Goovaerts P, Ping JL, Haddix ML (2006) Fine-resolution mapping of soil organic carbon based on multivariate secondary data. Geoderma. 132(3-4):471–489

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Sokal RR, Rohlf FJ (1981) Biometry. W.H. Freeman and Co., New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Sun WJ, Canadell JG, Yu LJ, Yu L, Zhang W, Smith P, Fischer T, Huang Y (2020) Climate drives global soil carbon sequestration and crop yield changes under conservation agriculture. Glob Chang Biol 26(6):3325–3335

    Google Scholar 

  • Sun WY, Guo SL, Zhou XG (2010) Effects of topographies and land uses on soil organic carbon in subsurface in hilly region of Loess Plateau. Huan Jing Ke Xue Huanjing Kexue 31(11):2740–2747

    Google Scholar 

  • Tao S, Xu X, Kou T (2012) Effect of soil organic matter on the contents of available and water-extracted phosphorus. Chin J Eco-Agric 20(8):1054–1058 (In Chinese)

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Vasu D, Singh SK, Sahu N, Tiwary P, Chandran P, Duraisami VP, Ramamurthy V, Lalitha M, Kalaiselvi B (2017) Assessment of spatial variability of soil properties using geospatial techniques for farm level nutrient management. Soil Till Rese 169:25–34

    Google Scholar 

  • Wang M, Su Y, Yang X (2014) Spatial distribution of soil organic carbon and its influencing factors in desert grasslands of the Hexi Corridor, Northwest China. PLoS One 9(4)

  • Wang N, Xue J, Peng J, Biswas A, He Y, Shi Z (2020) Integrating Remote Sensing and Landscape Characteristics to Estimate Soil Salinity Using Machine Learning Methods: A Case Study from Southern Xinjiang, China. Remote Sens-Basel 12(24):4118

    Google Scholar 

  • Wang YZ, Chen X, Shi Y (2013) Phosphorus availability in cropland soils of China and related affecting factors. J Appl Ecol 24(1):260–268 (In Chinese)

    Google Scholar 

  • Webster R, Oliver MA (2007) Geostatistics for environmental scientists[M]. Wiley

  • Wiesmeier M, Barthold F, Blank B, Kögel-Knabner I (2011) Digital mapping of soil organic matter stocks using Random Forest modeling in a semi-arid steppe ecosystem. Plant Soil 340(1-2):7–24

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Wilding LP (1985) Spatial variability: its documentation, accommodation, and implication to soil surveys. In: Nielsen DR, Bouma J (eds) Soil Spatial Variability. Pudoc, Wageningen, pp 166–194

    Google Scholar 

  • Wu C, Wu JP, Luo YM, Zhang LM, Degloria SD (2009) Spatial prediction of soil organic matter content using cokriging with remotely sensed data. Soil Sci Soc Am J 73(4):1202–1208

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Xia F, Hu BF, Shao S, Xu DY, Zhou Y, Zhou Y, Huang MX, Li Y, Chen SC, Shi Z (2019) Improvement of Spatial Modeling of Cr, Pb, Cd, As and Ni in Soil Based on Portable X-ray Fluorescence (PXRF) and Geostatistics: A Case Study in East China. Int J Environ Res Public Health 16(15):2694

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Xia F, Hu BF, Zhu Y, Ji WJ, Chen SC, Xu DY, Shi Z (2020) Improved Mapping of Potentially Toxic Elements in Soil via Integration of Multiple Data Sources and Various Geostatistical Methods. Remote Sens 12(22):3775

    Google Scholar 

  • Xie YF, Chen TB, Lei M, Yang J, Guo QJ, Song B, Zhou XY (2011) Spatial distribution of soil heavy metal pollution estimated by different interpolation methods: accuracy and uncertainty analysis. Chemosphere 82(3):468–476. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chemosphere.2010.09.053

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Yan FP, Shangguan W, Zhang J, Hu BF (2020) Depth-to-bedrock map of China at a spatial resolution of 100 meters. Sci Data 7(1):1–13

    Google Scholar 

  • Yang F, Xu Y, Cui Y, Meng YD, Dong Y, Li R, Ma YB (2017) Variation of soil organic matter content in croplands of China over the last three decades. Acta Pedofil Sin 54:1047–1056 (In Chinese)

    Google Scholar 

  • Yang Q, Zheng F, Jia X, Liu P, Dong S, Zhang J, Zhao B (2020) The combined application of organic and inorganic fertilizers increases soil organic matter and improves soil microenvironment in wheat-maize field. J Soils Sediments 1-10

  • Yang QY, Jiang ZC, Li WJ, Li H (2014) Prediction of soil organic matter in peak-cluster depression region using kriging and terrain indices. Soil Tillage Res 144:126–132

    Google Scholar 

  • Yu HY, Zha TG, Zhang XX, Nie LS, Ma LM, Pan YW (2020) Spatial distribution of soil organic carbon may be predominantly regulated by topography in a small revegetated watershed. CATENA. 188:104459

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Yuste JC, Penuelas J, Estiarte M, Garcia-Mas J, Mattana S, Ogaya R, Pujol M, Sardans J (2011) Drought-resistant fungi control soil organic matter decomposition and its response to temperature. Glob Chang Biol 17(3):1475–1486

    Google Scholar 

  • Zhang S, Huang Y, Shen C, Ye H, Du Y (2012) Spatial prediction of soil organic matter using terrain indices and categorical variables as auxiliary information. Geoderma. 171:35–43

    Google Scholar 

  • Zhou Y, Biswas A, Ma ZQ, Lu Y, Chen QX, Shi Z (2016) Revealing the scale-specific controls of soil organic matter at large scale in Northeast and North China Plain. Geoderma. 271:71–79

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Zhou Y, Chen SC, Zhu AX, Hu BF, Shi Z, Li Y (2021) Revealing the scale-and location-specific controlling factors of soil organic carbon in Tibet. Geoderma. 382:114713

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Zhong B, Xu YJ (2009) Topographic effects on soil organic carbon in Louisiana watersheds. Environ Manag 43(4):662–672

    Google Scholar 

  • Zhu B, Gutknecht JL, Herman DJ, Keck DC, Firestone MK, Cheng W (2014) Rhizosphere priming effects on soil carbon and nitrogen mineralization. Soil Biol Biochem 76:183–192

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Zhu J, Wu W, Liu HB (2018) Environmental variables controlling soil organic carbon in top-and sub-soils in karst region of southwestern China. Ecol Indic 90:624–632

    CAS  Google Scholar 

Download references

Funding

This work was supported by the Key Project of Education Department of Hunan Province China (19A242), the Project of China Hunan Provincial Department of Water Resources ([2017]230-34), and the Hunan Soil and Fertilizer Workstation. Bifeng Hu received support from the China Scholarship Council (under grant agreement No. 201706320317) for 3 years’ Ph.D. study in the French National Institute for Agriculture, Food, and Environment (INRAE) and Orléans University in France.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Resources and Environment, Hunan Agricultural University, Changsha, 410128, China

    Bifeng Hu, Qing Zhou, Changyuan He, Liangxia Duan, Weiyou Li, Gaoling Zhang & Hongxia Xie

  2. Department of Land Resource Management, School of Tourism and Urban Management, Jiangxi University of Finance and Economics, Nanchang, 330013, China

    Bifeng Hu & Jie Peng

  3. Unité de Recherche en Science du Sol, INRAE, 45075, Orléans, France

    Bifeng Hu

  4. College of land science and technology, China Agricultural University, Beijing, 100085, China

    Wenjun Ji

  5. College of Plant Science, Tarim University, Alar, 843300, China

    Jie Peng

Authors
  1. Bifeng Hu
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Qing Zhou
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Changyuan He
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Liangxia Duan
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  5. Weiyou Li
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  6. Gaoling Zhang
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  7. Wenjun Ji
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  8. Jie Peng
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  9. Hongxia Xie
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Qing Zhou or Hongxia Xie.

Ethics declarations

Conflict of interest

The authors declare no competing interests.

Disclaimer

The founding sponsors had no role in the design of the study; in the collection, analyses, or interpretation of data; in the writing of the manuscript; or in the decision to publish the results.

Additional information

Responsible editor: Anja Miltner

Publisher’s note

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Highlights

• Random forest was used to predict soil organic matter (SOM) with 17 covariates

• The mode had good performance for estimating SOM with R2 = 0.74 and RMSE = 0.16 g kg−1

• SOM presented strong spatial variability in Yueyang County

• Soil properties and climate factors controlled variation of SOM in Yueyang County

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Hu, B., Zhou, Q., He, C. et al. Spatial variability and potential controls of soil organic matter in the Eastern Dongting Lake Plain in southern China. J Soils Sediments 21, 2791–2804 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11368-021-02906-1

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11368-021-02906-1

Keywords

Search

Navigation