• We assessed the impacts of land use, climate and topography on soil properties. • Topsoil prope... more • We assessed the impacts of land use, climate and topography on soil properties. • Topsoil properties were not affected by land use except for clay content. • Latitude, precipitation, elevation affected the properties in forest and grassland. • Direct, indirect and total effects on SOC across land uses were identified by SEM. Soil physical and chemical properties are prerequisites to soil functionality, which depend importantly on land use, climate, and topography. However, previous works gave little consideration to the inherent causalities between properties under environmental influences. Here, we sampled 0-20 cm soil from 82 sites across the entire Yanhe watershed, including forest, shrubland, grassland, and agriculture. We applied structural equation modelling (SEM) to explore the environmental impacts on soil properties. The results showed that clay content (Clay%) in forest and grassland was significantly higher than in the agriculture area and shrubland. Redundancy analysis indicated that the variations of soil properties were explained by environmental factors, specifically in the forest (51.3%), shrubland (71.6%), grassland (77.6%), and agriculture area (95.5%). Hierarchical partition analysis independently extracted dominant factors and found that latitude, precipitation, and elevation were critical in forest and grassland; elevation and precipitation in shrubland; elevation and latitude in agriculture area. SEM identified soil organic carbon (SOC) was directly influenced by total nitrogen (TN) and total potassium (TK) in forest; by TK in shrubland; by TK and bulk density (BD) in grassland; by total phosphorus (TP) and BD in agriculture area. Path analysis on SOC identified different paths in forest, grassland, and agriculture, and the mediators included TN, BD, pH, and TP. These findings indicate that the influence of environmental factors on soil properties should take into account the interactions within soil conditions. Grassland has a good potential regional carbon sequestration.
Rapid environment change and urbanization process have profoundly altered the socio-ecological re... more Rapid environment change and urbanization process have profoundly altered the socio-ecological relationships and influenced on how local residents perceive ecosystem services (ES) and human well-being (HW). However, the quantified socio-cultural valuation of rural-urban comparison is still insufficient. In this study, we investigated the perception on provisioning, regulating, and cultural ES importance and HW satisfaction degree of basic materials, health, security, and social relations. Subsequently, we explored the linkages between and within ES and HW by face-to-face interviews with urban and rural residents. The results showed that rural residents valued more genetic resources, flood regulation, erosion regulation, and aesthetics ES, while urban residents gave high importance to wood & fiber ES. Overall, urban residents valued provisioning ES, while rural residents valued regulating ES. No difference was observed in cultural ES. For HW, rural residents felt more satisfied with security and health, while urban residents were more satisfied with basic materials. We observed strong relationships among provisioning and regulating ES in rural and urban communities, and the same was observed as in health and security HW. Principal component analysis (PCA) results showed the different variable associations in rural ES and urban HW as well as different groups in urban ES and rural HW. Through confirmation factor analysis (CFA), we screened out freshwater, water purification, air purification, and cultural value as dominant ES indicators for rural and urban population according to the framework of Millennium Ecosystem Assessment in Yanhe watershed. The assessment of people's perception can contribute to the integration of socio-cultural values into the policymaking process.
• We assessed the impacts of land use, climate and topography on soil properties. • Topsoil prope... more • We assessed the impacts of land use, climate and topography on soil properties. • Topsoil properties were not affected by land use except for clay content. • Latitude, precipitation, elevation affected the properties in forest and grassland. • Direct, indirect and total effects on SOC across land uses were identified by SEM. Soil physical and chemical properties are prerequisites to soil functionality, which depend importantly on land use, climate, and topography. However, previous works gave little consideration to the inherent causalities between properties under environmental influences. Here, we sampled 0-20 cm soil from 82 sites across the entire Yanhe watershed, including forest, shrubland, grassland, and agriculture. We applied structural equation modelling (SEM) to explore the environmental impacts on soil properties. The results showed that clay content (Clay%) in forest and grassland was significantly higher than in the agriculture area and shrubland. Redundancy analysis indicated that the variations of soil properties were explained by environmental factors, specifically in the forest (51.3%), shrubland (71.6%), grassland (77.6%), and agriculture area (95.5%). Hierarchical partition analysis independently extracted dominant factors and found that latitude, precipitation, and elevation were critical in forest and grassland; elevation and precipitation in shrubland; elevation and latitude in agriculture area. SEM identified soil organic carbon (SOC) was directly influenced by total nitrogen (TN) and total potassium (TK) in forest; by TK in shrubland; by TK and bulk density (BD) in grassland; by total phosphorus (TP) and BD in agriculture area. Path analysis on SOC identified different paths in forest, grassland, and agriculture, and the mediators included TN, BD, pH, and TP. These findings indicate that the influence of environmental factors on soil properties should take into account the interactions within soil conditions. Grassland has a good potential regional carbon sequestration.
Rapid environment change and urbanization process have profoundly altered the socio-ecological re... more Rapid environment change and urbanization process have profoundly altered the socio-ecological relationships and influenced on how local residents perceive ecosystem services (ES) and human well-being (HW). However, the quantified socio-cultural valuation of rural-urban comparison is still insufficient. In this study, we investigated the perception on provisioning, regulating, and cultural ES importance and HW satisfaction degree of basic materials, health, security, and social relations. Subsequently, we explored the linkages between and within ES and HW by face-to-face interviews with urban and rural residents. The results showed that rural residents valued more genetic resources, flood regulation, erosion regulation, and aesthetics ES, while urban residents gave high importance to wood & fiber ES. Overall, urban residents valued provisioning ES, while rural residents valued regulating ES. No difference was observed in cultural ES. For HW, rural residents felt more satisfied with security and health, while urban residents were more satisfied with basic materials. We observed strong relationships among provisioning and regulating ES in rural and urban communities, and the same was observed as in health and security HW. Principal component analysis (PCA) results showed the different variable associations in rural ES and urban HW as well as different groups in urban ES and rural HW. Through confirmation factor analysis (CFA), we screened out freshwater, water purification, air purification, and cultural value as dominant ES indicators for rural and urban population according to the framework of Millennium Ecosystem Assessment in Yanhe watershed. The assessment of people's perception can contribute to the integration of socio-cultural values into the policymaking process.
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Papers by Siqi Yang