Cliff T. Johnston, Purdue Univ, Crop Soil and Environmental Sciences, Dept of Agronomy, West Lafayette, IN 47907, Richard Grant, Purdue University-Agronomy Dept., Purdue Univ.- Agronomy, 915 W. State St., West Lafayette, IN 47907-2054, and Laura Bowling, Purdue Univ, Agronomy Dept, 915 W State Street, West Lafayette, IN 47907-2054.
Recent years have witnessed a witnessed a surge of activity in the field of carbon sequestration. Although considerable attention has focused on management practices that can increase the rate of accumulation of soil carbon, the loss of carbon from cultivated organic soils which represent only a small proportion of the agricultural landscape, can play a dominant, negative role. In Indiana, for example, the CENTURY model has predicted that more carbon is being lost from the cultivated organic soils (< 1.5 percent of the total agricultural land area) than is being stored from using conservation tillage and savings from being set aside in the Conservation Research Program. This study seeks to quantify these estimates to explore the influence of water management. In this study, CO2 flux measurements are being combined with periodic measures of photosynthetic activity, water table height and soil moisture measurements.
