Emerging land use practices rapidly increase soil organic matter
Open accessAbstract
The loss of organic matter from agricultural lands constrains our ability to sustainably feed a growing population and mitigate the impacts of climate change. Addressing these challenges requires land use activities that accumulate soil carbon (C) while contributing to food production. In a region of extensive soil degradation in the southeastern United States, we evaluated soil C accumulation for 3 years across a 7-year chronosequence of three farms converted to management-intensive grazing. Here we show that these farms accumulated C at 8.0 Mg ha−1 yr−1, increasing cation exchange and water holding capacity by 95% and 34%, respectively. Thus, within a decade of management-intensive grazing practices soil C levels returned to those of native forest soils, and likely decreased fertilizer and irrigation demands. Emerging land uses, such as management-intensive grazing, may offer a rare win–win strategy combining profitable food production with rapid improvement of soil quality and short-term climate mitigation through soil C-accumulation. Agricultural practices can degrade soil conditions through the loss of organic matter, a situation that will be exacerbated with growing populations. Here, the authors show that converting cropland to management intensive grazing can rapidly improve soil quality and increase organic matter concentrations.
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Studies indicate that in general, well-managed grasslands continue to sequester C at greater rates than improved cropland, and transitions from cropland to grassland show some of the greatest rates of C sequestration, ranging from 0.22 to 8.0 Mg C ha-1 yr-1.
“Nevertheless, studies indicate that in general, well-managed grasslands continue to sequester C at greater rates than improved cropland, and transitions from cropland to grassland show some of the greatest rates of C sequestration, ranging from 0.22 to 8.0 Mg C ha -1 yr -1 (Machmuller et al., 2015;Mathew et al., 2017;Minasny et al., 2017;Powlson et al., 2011).”
From Impacts of soil carbon sequestration on life cycle greenhouse gas emissions in Midwestern USA beef finishing systems (2018) · cites this paper as Machmuller et al., 2015
Split into 2 atoms — 0 confirmed, 2 partially supported, 0 disputed, 0 misattributed, 0 unverifiable. Expand the claim to see per-atom verdicts.
Experimental — accuracy not yet measuredMachmuller et al. (2015) reported mean sequestration values as great as 8.0 ± 0.85 Mg C ha-1 yr-1 in the top 30 cm of soil for a 7-year duration when converting degraded cropland to AMP grazing.
“Finally, when converting degraded cropland to AMP grazing, Machmuller et al. (2015) reported mean sequestration values as great as 8.0 ± 0.85 Mg C ha -1 yr -1 in the top 30 cm of soil for a 7-year duration.”
From Impacts of soil carbon sequestration on life cycle greenhouse gas emissions in Midwestern USA beef finishing systems (2018) · cites this paper as Machmuller et al. (2015)
The “Rapid soil C accumulation” section reports a peak gain of 8.0 ± 0.85 Mg C ha⁻¹ yr⁻¹ in the upper 30 cm after conversion to intensively grazed pasture. It places that peak 2–6 years after establishment; the Abstract describes a 7-year chronosequence, not seven years sustained at that rate. The claimed 7-year duration of sequestration at 8.0 ± 0.85 is therefore unsupported. (LLM, conf=0.87)
Experimental — accuracy not yet measuredExisting studies on AMP and SOC have generally relied on space-for-time comparisons rather than longitudinal data.
“Existing studies on AMP and SOC have generally relied on space-for-time comparisons rather than longitudinal data (Machmuller et al., 2015;Mehre et al., 2024;Rowntree et al., 2020;Wang et al., 2015), focused on cropland-to-pasture transitions (Machmuller et al., 2015;Mehre et al., 2024;Rowntree et al., 2020), or evaluated only short-term shifts from conventional grazing (Stanley et al., 2018).”
From Impact of 10 years of adaptive multi-paddock grazing on soil carbon and beef's greenhouse gas footprint in the US Upper Midwest (2026) · cites this paper as Machmuller et al., 2015
The Abstract describes this study as a chronosequence comparing pastures established in different years, supporting its use as a space-for-time example. It also says the authors sampled across the pastures over two years, so the study did include repeated measurements; this paper alone does not establish what existing studies generally relied on. (LLM, conf=0.84)
Experimental — accuracy not yet measuredExisting studies on AMP and SOC have focused on cropland-to-pasture transitions.
“focused on cropland-to-pasture transitions (Machmuller et al., 2015;Mehre et al., 2024;Rowntree et al., 2020)”
From Impact of 10 years of adaptive multi-paddock grazing on soil carbon and beef's greenhouse gas footprint in the US Upper Midwest (2026) · cites this paper as Machmuller et al., 2015
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Cites
Soil carbon sequestration and land‐use change: processes and potential
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GRASSLAND MANAGEMENT AND CONVERSION INTO GRASSLAND: EFFECTS ON SOIL CARBON
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Stanley, P. L., Rowntree, J. E., Beede, D. K., DeLonge, M. S., & Hamm, M. W. (2018) · Agricultural Systems · doi:10.1016/j.agsy.2018.02.003 · Cited by 266 · see citing works
Concepts of agricultural marginal lands and their utilisation: a review
Csikós, N., & Tóth, G. (2023) · Agricultural Systems · doi:10.1016/j.agsy.2022.103560 · Cited by 135 · see citing works
Ecosystem Impacts and Productive Capacity of a Multi-Species Pastured Livestock System
Rowntree, J. E., Stanley, P. L., Maciel, I. C. F., Thorbecke, M., Rosenzweig, S. T., Hancock, D. W., Guzman, A., & Raven, M. R. (2020) · Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems · doi:10.3389/fsufs.2020.544984 · Cited by 110 · see citing works
“Livestock are the primary users of this extensive land base and are an important management tool for mediating increased soil C sequestration (Liebig et al., 2010; Teague et al., 2011; McSherry and Ritchie, 2013; Machmuller et al., 2015; Wang et al., 2015; Griscom et al., 2017).”
BackgroundSelf-citationStanley, P., Roche, L., & Bowles, T. (2025) · International Journal of Agricultural Sustainability · doi:10.1080/14735903.2025.2461826 · Cited by 17 · see citing works
Garcia, L., Stanley, P. L., Sacramento, J. P., Dillon, J. A., Thorbecke, M., Thompson, L. R., Ambike, V., Sharma, P., Xu, S., Chiavegato, M. B., et al. (2026) · Agricultural Systems · doi:10.1016/j.agsy.2026.104879 · Cited by 1 · see citing works
- Authors
- Machmuller, M. B., Kramer, M. G., Cyle, T. K., Hill, N., Hancock, D., & Thompson, A.
- Affiliations
- University of Georgia (US)
- University of Florida (US)
- Corresponding author
- Thompson, Aaron
- Venue
- Nature Communications
- Published
- 2015-04-30
- Volume
- 6
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 6995-6995
- ISSN
- 2041-1723 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W1969725742
- Cited by
- 209
- References
- 2
- Citations by year
- 2026: 18 · 2025: 26 · 2024: 23 · 2023: 17 · 2022: 26 · 2021: 26 · 2020: 20 · 2019: 12 · 2018: 14 · 2017: 11 · 2016: 12 · 2015: 2 · 2013: 1
- FWCI
- 17.84
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- gold
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Nature Communications (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- RePEc: Research Papers in Economics (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- U.S. Department of Energy
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration
- U.S. Department of Agriculture
- National Institute of Food and Agriculture (2011-57003-30366)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Soil Science › Soil Carbon and Nitrogen Dynamics
- Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Soil Science › Soil erosion and sediment transport
- Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Soil Science › Soil Management and Crop Yield
- Keywords
- soil organic matter, soil carbon accumulation, management-intensive grazing, land use change, cropland conversion, soil degradation, soil quality, cation exchange, water holding capacity, climate change mitigation, food production, chronosequence
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