Evaluating the response of ecosystems to land-use change using soil quality index-Alandan forest Sari

This study investigated the influence of land-use change on soil quality in the Alandan area of Sari, with five different types of land-uses, namely pure beech stand and destructed forest stand, ash plantation, pine plantation, and arable land. Soil samples were taken from a soil depth of 0-10cm, using six plots (20×20m) in each site, which were selected by random systematic sampling network (50×100 m). The different physical, chemical, and biological characteristics of soil were measured in the laboratory. To calculate the soil quality index, characteristics such as field capacity, bulk density, geometric mean diameter, calcium, magnesium, and phosphorus availability, total nitrogen, ammonium, nitrogen microbial biomass and urease, acid phosphatase, and invertase enzyme were selected as the minimum data set by principal component analysis. In this study, additive and weighted indices were used to evaluate soil quality. The results showed that the higher amount of both additive and weighted index of soil quality were observed in ash plantation (0.76, 0.25), and their lowest amount was found in pine plantation (0.58, 0.16) and arable land (0.54, 0.15), respectively. It should be noted that the weighted index of soil quality in ash plantations was significantly higher than in different pine plantations and arable land. Also, the results of this study confirm that rehabilitation of degraded forests using coniferous species, which has led to a decrease in soil quality, such as soil condition in agricultural land, is not recommended.