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Soil Carbon Stocks of the Brazilian Amazon Basin

Centro de Energia Nuclear na Agricultura, Caixa Postal 96, CEP 13.400-970, Piracicaba, SP, Brazil

Jerry M. Melillo, David Kicklighter, Christopher Neill and Paul A. Steudler

The Ecosystems Center, Marine Biological Lab., Woods Hole, MA 02543

David L. Skole

Inst. for the Study of Earth, Oceans and Space, Univ. of New Hampshire, Durham, NH 03824

* Corresponding author ( jflmorae{at}pira.cena.usp.br).

ABSTRACT

We determined stocks of C and N for soils under undisturbed vegetation across the Brazilian Amazon Basin based on 1162 soil profiles of the RADAMBRASIL survey and a digitized Brazilian soil survey map. Mean basin soil C density was 10.3 kg C m^–2. Forty-seven petagrams C and 4.4 Pg N were contained in the top 1 m of soil. Forty-five percent of total basin soil C (21 Pg C) and 41% of total soil N (1.8 Pg N) were contained in the top 20 cm across a 5 000 000-km² area. Mean C/N ratio for the basin to a depth of 1 m was 10.7. Because these data represent sites with forest vegetation in the absence of significant disturbances, they represent a valuable baseline for evaluating the effects of land-use changes on soil C stocks in the Amazon Basin.

Received for publication May 7, 1993.

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