Many rivers in the Yangtze River basin have suffered from excess nitrogen due to increased humanactivities in recent decades. Soil denitrification in riparian wetlands is a key process for removing nitro-gen from polluted surface runoff and controlling eutrophication in river ecosystems. Currently, little isknown about the influence of topography and land use on the riparian denitrification characteristics inthe Yangtze River basin. In this study, we used the acetylene block technique to determine the spatialvariability of the soil potential and unamended dentrification rates of 42 riparian wetlands in the HanRiver basin of China. The results indicated that riparian soils showed great spatial variation in potentialdenitrification, unamended dentrification and most of the measured physical and chemical properties.Both potential and unamended dentrification rates were positively associated with soil moisture, per-centage of fine substrate, organic matter and nitrogen contents, but were negatively related to soil pHand bulk density. Agricultural riparian soils had unamended denitrification rates higher than forestedriparian soils. Spearman correlation analysis also indicated that a topographic factor (i.e., elevation) hada negative effect on riparian denitrification rates. Our results suggest that both topography and land usecan indirectly influence the soil denitrification rates in riparian wetlands. Low-elevation areas in theagricultural riparian zone are good candidates for wetland restoration or creation for nitrogen removaland water quality improvement in the Yangtze River basin.
Copyright 2002 - 2023 Wuhan Botanical Garden,Chinese Academy Of
Sciences
Email: wbgoffice@wbgcas.cn ICP: 05004779-1
