TY - JOUR

T1 - Soil temperature manipulation to study global warming effects in arable land

T2 - performance of buried heating-cable method

AU - Patil, Raveendra H.

AU - Laegdsmand, Mette

AU - Olesen, Jørgen Eivind

AU - Porter, John Roy

PY - 2013

Y1 - 2013

N2 - Buried heating-cable method for manipulating soil temperature was designed and tested its performance in large concrete lysimeters grown with the wheat crop in Denmark. Soil temperature in heated plots was elevated by 5 oC compared with that in control by burying heating-cable at 0.1 m depth in a plough layer. Temperature sensors were placed at 0.05, 0.1 and 0.25 m depths in soil, and 0.1 m above the soil surface in all plots, which were connected to an automated data logger. Soil-warming setup was able to maintain a mean seasonal temperature difference of 5.0 ± 0.005 oC between heated and control plots at 0.1 m depth while the mean seasonal rise in soil temperature in the top 0.25 m depth (plough layer) was 3 oC. Soil temperature in control plots froze (≤ 0 oC) for 15 and 13 days respectively at 0.05 and 0.1 m depths while it did not in heated plots during the coldest period (Nov-Apr). This study clearly showed the efficacy of buried heating-cable technique in simulating soil temperature, and thus offers a simple, effective and alternative technique to study soil biogeochemical processes under warmer climates. This technique, however, decouples below-ground soil responses from that of above-ground vegetation response as this method heats only the soil. Therefore, using infrared heaters seems to represent natural climate warming (both air and soil) much more closely and may be used for future climate manipulation field studies.

AB - Buried heating-cable method for manipulating soil temperature was designed and tested its performance in large concrete lysimeters grown with the wheat crop in Denmark. Soil temperature in heated plots was elevated by 5 oC compared with that in control by burying heating-cable at 0.1 m depth in a plough layer. Temperature sensors were placed at 0.05, 0.1 and 0.25 m depths in soil, and 0.1 m above the soil surface in all plots, which were connected to an automated data logger. Soil-warming setup was able to maintain a mean seasonal temperature difference of 5.0 ± 0.005 oC between heated and control plots at 0.1 m depth while the mean seasonal rise in soil temperature in the top 0.25 m depth (plough layer) was 3 oC. Soil temperature in control plots froze (≤ 0 oC) for 15 and 13 days respectively at 0.05 and 0.1 m depths while it did not in heated plots during the coldest period (Nov-Apr). This study clearly showed the efficacy of buried heating-cable technique in simulating soil temperature, and thus offers a simple, effective and alternative technique to study soil biogeochemical processes under warmer climates. This technique, however, decouples below-ground soil responses from that of above-ground vegetation response as this method heats only the soil. Therefore, using infrared heaters seems to represent natural climate warming (both air and soil) much more closely and may be used for future climate manipulation field studies.

U2 - 10.13189/ eer.2013.010402

DO - 10.13189/ eer.2013.010402

M3 - Journal article

VL - 1

SP - 196

EP - 204

JO - Environment and Ecology Research

JF - Environment and Ecology Research

SN - 2331-625X

IS - 4

ER -