Estimation on Soil Organic Carbon following Enrichment Planting at Reforestation Sites in Gunung Apeng National Park, Sarawak

• Main Author: Mohd Masrinizam, Bin Iskandar
• Format: Final Year Project Report
• Language: English; English
• Published: Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (UNIMAS) 2017
• Subjects: S Agriculture (General)
• Online Access: http://ir.unimas.my/id/eprint/27829/1/Estimation%20on%20Soil%20Organic%20Carbon%2024pgs.pdf; http://ir.unimas.my/id/eprint/27829/5/M%20Masrinizam%20ft.pdf; http://ir.unimas.my/id/eprint/27829/

Soil organic carbon (SOC) is one of the factors that influence the growth development of the trees and it is important to maintain the soil fertility, nutrient cycling, soil structures and soil water holding capacity. A study was conducted in Gunung Apeng National Park, Sarawak in order to quantify the differences in soil organic carbon as well as other relevant soil properties following enrichment planting. Reforestation sites which were planted with Dryobalanops beccarii by line planting system were selected in this study. Study sites were established at young reforestation site (year 2014; DB14), old reforestation site (year 2006; DB06), secondary forest (SF) and disturbed site (DS). Undisturbed and composite soil samples were collected from several random points at the depth of 0-10 cm, 10-20 cm and 20-30 cm, respectively. The findings indicated that the average soil total carbon in secondary forest was significantly higher as compared to all the other study sites. However, in terms of the mass of soil organic carbon estimation, DB06 depicted the highest value with 1266.45 g m-2 followed by DB14 site with 1117.26 g m-2 at the depth of 0-30 cm, respectively. The estimated average annual changes in SOC at DB06 site and SF site were 3.45 Mg C ha-1 yr-1 and 2.05 Mg C ha-1 yr-1 . The estimate of the average annual changes in SOC at DB06 and SF sites were almost similar since the soils were near SOC equilibrium. Differences were observed in several soil properties but strong correlations with SOC content were only observed for bulk density. In conclusion, these results indicate that within 2 decades of tree planting, there was significantly greater SOC in soil and reach SOC equilibrium based on SOC average annual changes.