Authors
Jenny Farmer, Jo U Smith, Helen Burton, Yit Arn Teh
Published in
Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences. Volume 381. Issue 1956. Aug 20, 2026.
Abstract
Tropical wetlands contribute significantly to global carbon dioxide (CO2) and methane (CH4) emissions; however, gaps exist in understanding emissions sources and drivers, especially in African peatlands. We captured plant-mediated and diffusive CH4 and CO2 emissions from monthly chamber sampling from both plants and soils in an intact Cyperus papyrus wetland in Eastern Uganda. This wetland was a strong source of atmospheric CH4 in the rainy season, with monthly plant-mediated CH4 fluxes averaging 3.6 ± 0.8 nmol CH4 stem-1 s-1 (± s.e. ), and monthly diffusive CH4 emissions averaging 918 ± 96 nmol CH4 m-2 s-1. Heterotrophic CO2 emissions sampled from trenched plots were highest during the dry season with a mean of 3410 ± 212 nmol CO2 m-2 s-1 over this period. Stem measurements varied seasonally in stem count and biomass, with higher C. papyrus biomass in the dry season, averaging 1888 ± 130 g dry biomass m-2. Linear models showed a significant effect of water levels on CH4 and CO2 emissions from soils and plants (p < 0.1 to p < 0.001). This study is the first to observe CH4 emissions directly from the C. papyrus plant and contributes to the limited datasets on carbon cycling in these systems. A French translation of this abstract is available in the supplementary material. This article is part of the discussion meeting issue 'African tropical peatlands: function, value and vulnerability'.
PMID:
42619513
Bibliographic data and abstract were imported from PubMed on 20 Aug 2026.
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