摘要：Cultivation of perennial crops can be an option to sequester carbon in agricultural soils. To determine the carbon budget of a perennial cropping system under the boreal climate, we studied carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) and methane (CH 4 ) exchange of timothy and meadow fescue mixture (TIM) on a boreal mineral soil. Based on the mean annual net ecosystem CO 2 exchange (NEE), TIM was a sink for both CO 2 (–1000 g CO 2 m –2 ) and CH 4 (–140 mg CH 4 m –2 ). In comparison, soil without vegetation (BARE) was a source of CO 2 (1300 g CO 2 m –2 ). Based on the literature review, the net CO 2 uptake of TIM was similar to the perennial cropping systems in northern Finland but higher than that of the annual cropping systems in this region. Our multi-year study shows that the perennial cultivation system based on TIM is an environmentally sustainable land-use option to mitigate agricultural CO 2 emissions in regions with short growing seasons.
