Soil respiration in cucumber field under crop rotation in solar greenhouse

Crop residues are the primary source of carbon input in the soil carbon pool. Crop rotation can impact the plant biomass returned to the soil, and influence soil respiration. To study the effect of previous crops on soil respiration in cucumber (Cucumis statirus L.) fields in solar greenhouses, soil respiration, plant height, leaf area and yield were measured during the growing season (from the end of Sept to the beginning of Jun the following year) from 2007 to 2010. The cucumber was grown following fallow (CK), kidney bean (KB), cowpea (CP), maize for green manure (MGM), black bean for green manure (BGM), tomato (TM), bok choy (BC). As compared with CK, KB, CP, MGM and BGM may increase soil respiration, while TM and BC may decrease soil respiration at full fruit stage in cucumber fields. Thus attention to the previous crop arrangement is a possible way of mitigating soil respiration in vegetable fields. Plant height, leaf area and yield had similar variation trends under seven previous crop treatments. The ratio of yield to soil respiration revealed that MGM is the crop of choice previous to cucumber when compared with CK, KB, CP, BGM, TM and BC

Selected groundwater studies of EU project AquaTerra leading to large-scale basin considerations

Several local groundwater studies within the EU project AquaTerra in the Basins of the Meuse, Elbe point at significant influences of groundwater on surface water, while the Brévilles Catchment shows a distinct problematic of pesticide loading to groundwater. Further modeling studies are currently being developed. In the Danube Basin no specific groundwater studies were carried out in the framework of AquaTerra. However on larger scales geochemical proxies such as strontium isotope ratios can give an insight into groundwater contributions to the river that reflects an integral signal of the environmental status of the Basin. Future local groundwater studies should be further correlated to the environmental status of rivers nearby

Stalagmite evidence for the onset of the Last Interglacial in southern Europe at 129 a 1 ka

A stable isotope record from a stalagmite collected from Antro del Corchia cave (Apuan Alps, Central Italy), supported by 17 uranium-series ages, indicates enhanced regional rainfall between ca. 8.9 and 7.3 kyr cal. BP at the time of sapropel S1 deposition. Within this phase, the highest rainfall occurred between 7.9 and 7.4 kyr cal. BP. Comparison with different marine and lake records, and in particular with the Soreq Cave record (Israel), suggests substantial in-phase occurrence of enhanced rainfall between the Western and Eastern Mediterranean basins. There is no convincing evidence for major climatic change at the time of the “8.2 ka event”