Table 1.
Summary of stand and site characteristics measured in summer 2010 (mean ±1 SD; n = 3).
Table 2.
Initial substrate quality (mean ±1SD, n = 3) of leaf litter in Pinus massoniana forests studied.
Figure 1.
Seasonal patterns and monthly dynamics of the total soil respiration (•), litter respiration (○), and the litter-free soil respiration (▾) in different-aged Pinus massoniana forests (mean ±1SD, n = 9).
Table 3.
Effects of forest age and sampling time on the total soil respiration, litter-free soil respiration, and litter respiration in Pinus massoniana forests tested using repeated measures ANOVAs.
Figure 2.
Observed (•) and predicted (○) values of litter dry mass remaining across the experimental period in different-aged Pinus massoniana forests (mean ±1SD, n = 9).
Figure 3.
Relationships between mean monthly litter decomposition and the total soil respiration (a), litter respiration (b), and litter-free soil respiration rate (c) for different-aged Pinus massoniana forests.
Note: respiration rate is the mean value across the litter decomposition period.
Figure 4.
Soil temperature (5 cm soil depth), soil water content (5 cm soil depth) and litter water content in different-aged Pinus massoniana forests studied across the experiment period.
Figure 5.
Relationships between the total soil respiration (a, b), litter respiration (c, d), litter-free soil respiration (e, f) and soil temperature at 5 cm depth or soil water content at 5 cm depth in different-aged Pinus massoniana forests during the 18-months field observations.
Table 4.
The functions and model fit parameters (n, R2 and P-values) between measured soil respiration with soil temperature (T), soil moisture content (SWC) and litter water content (LWC) in Pinus massoniana forests.
Figure 6.
Relationships between litter decomposition (%) and soil temperature (a) or soil water content (b) in different-aged Pinus massoniana forests.