Agricultural Land‐Use Increases Carbon Yields in Lowland Streams of the Congo Basin
(2024) Journal of Geophysical Research: Biogeosciences — Vol. 129, n° 3, p. 14 (2024)
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- Authors
Drake, Travis W. 
Baumgartner, Simon Six, Johan
- Abstract
- hifting agriculture, which is the main way forests are cleared in theCongo Basin, is expected to increase as the population grows. To see how this type of deforestation affects theamount of carbon that ends up in rivers, we studied two types of watersheds: one with only forest and one withmostly farms. We measured the water flow and carbon levels in streams draining these watersheds for a year.We found that the stream draining the farmed area had more water and more carbon compared to the foreststream. This means that more carbon from plants and soil was being washed into the farm stream. The carbon inboth streams came from similar sources: partially broken‐down plants and topsoil that were recently grown orformed, respectively. The farm stream had a bit more carbon that could break down further once it entered thestream. These findings tell us that farming sends more plant matter and carbon into rivers. This could affect howmuch carbon is stored in the soil and how much goes back into the air
- Affiliations
Citations
Drake, T. W., Baumgartner, S., Barthel, M., Bauters, M., Alebadwa, S., Akoko, N. B., Haghipour, N., Eglinton, T., Van Oost, K., Boeckx, P., & Six, J. (2024). Agricultural Land‐Use Increases Carbon Yields in Lowland Streams of the Congo Basin. Journal of Geophysical Research: Biogeosciences, 129(3), 14. https://doi.org/10.1029/2023jg007751 (Original work published 2024)