Soil carbon and soil physical properties under land use change in a protected area of Sicily

This work investigated the role of land cover and land use change as a soil’s ability to store carbon and reduce carbon dioxide emission in a Mediterranean area. Using both historic records and land cover crop maps we estimated the effect of land cover change on the carbon stock from 1972 to 2008 in a natural reserve (Grotta di S. Ninfa) in the West of Sicily. Five paired sites in different soil types were selected and five land use classes (arable land, vineyard, olivegrove, gariga, eucalyptus afforestation) were analyzed. We studied the effect of land use on soil organic carbon (SOC) content in bulk soil and 1000-2000 m, 500-1000 m, 250-500 m, 63-250 m, 25-63 m and