Open AccessSoil respiration and microbial population in tropical peat under oil palm plantation
Author(s) -
Siti Fatimah Batubara,
Fahmuddin Agus,
Abdur Rauf,
Deni Elfiati
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
iop conference series. earth and environmental science
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.179
H-Index - 26
eISSN - 1755-1307
pISSN - 1755-1315
DOI - 10.1088/1755-1315/260/1/012083
Subject(s) - peat , respiration , population , soil respiration , respiration rate , zoology , carbon dioxide , chemistry , environmental chemistry , agronomy , biology , botany , ecology , demography , sociology
Peatland clearance and drainage result in the change of anaerobic to aerobic condition and hence microbial activities that increase CO 2 emission. This study aimed to evaluate the rate of microbial respiration and microbial population from sapric and hemic peat under oil palm plantation. Research activities included measurement of soil respiration using potassium hydroxide (KOH) to capture the respired CO 2 , and counting the population of microbes. Results of this study showed that the highest rate of respiration of 3.3 ± 0.8 mg CO 2 100 g −1 day −1 occurred from the 0-20 cm layer and it decreased to 2.1 ± 1.0 mg CO 2 100 g −1 day −1 from the 20-40 cm layer and 1.2 ± 0.9 mg CO 2 100 g −1 day −1 from the 40-60 cm layer in sapric peat. For the hemic peat the highest rate of respiration of 3.1 ± 0.4 mg CO 2 100 g −1 day −1 occurred from the 0-20 cm layer and it decreased to 2.0 ± 0.7 mg CO 2 100 g −1 day −1 from the 20-40 cm layer. Soil respiration decreased with peat depth and bacteria were the most dominant microbes in each peat depth, indicating that bacteria play a more important role in respiration than other microbes.