Environment impact on crop-scale respiration

Abstract

Croplands cover approximately 45 % of Europe and play an important role in the overall carbon budget of the continent. However, the estimation of their carbon balance remains uncertain due to the diversity of environment and climatic indices, crops together with the strong influence of human management. Based on the continuous observation of soil-plant respiration and environmental factors in a several crops ecosystem from early June to early July in 2010, the spatial and temporal variation of soil-plant respiration and their controlling factors were analyzed. A survey was conducted to identify important criteria, and several crop fields were introduced which represent different value systems by varying criteria importance. The approach is based on the local measurement and comparing the impact of environment physical indices on agro ecosystem productivity at crop habitat scale. The study was conducted in intensive grassland, barely, winter wheat and maize ecosystems at a conventional farm (Kalvarija distr., 54º28 N, 23º38 E). The data have been collected in a real time using digital sensors of the humidity, pressure, gas concentration, solar intensity, wind speed and temperature. All the dependencies of the various physical data were valuated according to the plant growth. The data were obtained in productive grasslands with different fertilizer application and in crop fields of different geographical location. The experimental data confirm that the average meteorological data obtained from the State Meteorology Stations are quite preliminary and cannot be unambiguously considered as the environmental factors on the wide area of vegetation with different soils. The picked data set should be used when analysing ecological drivers on the fluctuation of the climate. Measurement of the properties that affect fluid storage and transport, such as macro porosity, provided soil quality indices that helped in recommending suitable soil management systems.