Response of soil respiration to soil temperature and moisture in a 50-year-old oriental arborvitae plantation in China

China possesses large areas of plantation forests which take up great quantities of carbon. However, studies on soil respiration in these plantation forests are rather scarce and their soil carbon flux remains an uncertainty. In this study, we used an automatic chamber system to measure soil surface flux of a 50-year-old mature plantation of Platycladus orientalis at Jiufeng Mountain, Beijing, China. Mean daily soil respiration rates (R(s)) ranged from 0.09 to 4.87 µmol CO(2) m(-2) s(-1), with the highest values observed in August and the lowest in the winter months. A logistic model gave the best fit to the relationship between hourly R(s) and soil temperature (T(s)), explaining 82% of the variation in R(s) over the annual cycle. The annual total of soil respiration estimated from the logistic model was 645±5 g C m(-2) year(-1). The performance of the logistic model was poorest during periods of high soil temperature or low soil volumetric water content (VWC), which limits the model's ability to predict the seasonal dynamics of R(s). The logistic model will potentially overestimate R(s) at high T(s) and low VWC. Seasonally, R(s) increased significantly and linearly with increasing VWC in May and July, in which VWC was low. In the months from August to November, inclusive, in which VWC was not limiting, R(s) showed a positively exponential relationship with T(s). The seasonal sensitivity of soil respiration to T(s) (Q(10)) ranged from 0.76 in May to 4.38 in October. It was suggested that soil temperature was the main determinant of soil respiration when soil water was not limiting.