Salam

I send my research paper. study it. it will help in your study if any problem I will be there.

1.      Musharaf Khan, Farrukh Hussain, Shahana Musharaf and Imdadullah. 2014. Ground biomass assessment of shrub species in Tehsil Takht-e-Nasrati, Pakistan. Pakistan Journal of Botany, 46(3): 921-926.

2.      Musharaf Khan and Farrukh Hussain. 2012. Altitudinal and Seasonal Effect on Herbaceous Biomass in Tehsil Takht-E-Nasrati, District Karak, Pakistan. Global Journal of Science Frontier Research. 12(7): 40-52.

Thanks

There is NO universal relationship.  It will depend on both soil and climatic conditions, so using a relationship from the literature will likely lead to erroneous conclusions.

I recommend alternative approaches to arrive at biomass estimates, e.g., using remote sensing.

I'm not sure I understand this question correctly:

you want to estimate the amount of litter (leaf litter?) produced annually(?) based on ... what?

Hans is right - there are hardly any general quantitative relationships in ecology...

I don't understand the question clearly, but the litterfall and standing litter on the forest floor are different. The litterfall (including leaves, flowers, fruits, branches) can be observed by the litter traps. The standing litter on the ground can be observed by sampling the litter and obtain the dry mass. These methods are straight forward. The relationships between biomass and measurable parameters do exist, which using "allometric equations" as a tool to estimate the biomass by input the measurable parameters such as tree diamete, height, etc. into the equation that was form the relationships of the huge numbers of samplings (Chave et al., 2005; Komiyama et al, 2005). I've never seen anyone did the percent of litter and biomass before. Another problem of this calculation is the type of vegetation and study site. The equations and relationships are very specific to the site and species. You can develop your own relationships of litter-biomass, if you have enough raw data and they are correlated. I hope this help.

Dear Musharaf

Thank you for your paper,

 Good luck

Dear Hans

Hello

In your opinion, i can extract biomass data from landsat data?

Because of landsat data has 30 m *30 m resolution, in other word 0.9 ha.

But my sampling plots were 2m *2m, and it can create a big error. 

In addition the vegetation cover is very dynamic and in small place can very change,

but each pixel of landsat data has a one DN.

Dear Chadtip

hello

In general, I want measure the rangeland condition based the method present by

Faramarzi et al. (2010). 

'' Rangeland condition in relation to environmental variables, grazing intensity and livestock owners’perceptions in semi-arid rangeland in western Iran ''

This method using bare soil, litter frequency, plant palatability and biomass production, Determine the rangeland condition.

Now, I need the biomass data for evaluate condition of rangeland in my study area.

I measure the litter, and I'm trying to use a mathematical equation to calculate the amount of biomass.

Dear Chadtip

Thank you for your help and your paper,

 In fact, I do not have biomass data; I'm trying to use a mathematical equation to calculate the amount of biomass from litter frequency.

I can use remote sensing data, but I think this method has error.

Now, I am searching to find a formula to transform litter frequency to biomass.

Dear Rezza,

If your plots are too small to use remote sensing, your only option is to collect biomass data (on plots close to the ones you seek to study) as well as using litter traps.  There is no universal relationship between biomass and litter production.  You will have to establish the correlation for the sites you are interested in.

Regards,

Hans

Dear Hans

I really thank you for your description, its great help for me.

I think best way is that i repeat my sampling, after this, i tried to define a relationship between biomass and litter and compassion with biomass data extracting from different satellite image.

Best regards.

Hi Reza

I attach a paper where I studied leaf litter (mainly) and its decomposition using net bags in a fenced area...it may be of some help.

kamal

Dear Kamal

Hello

Thank you for your paper,

I search for mathematical relationship for transform the litter data to amount of biomass. In fact i do not found any relationship and decide repeat my sampling.

Good luck

Dear Reza

As others have said here, it would be dangerous to extrapolate from litter to biomass, because the amount of litter can be affected by so many factors including date since last burn, rainfall, temperature etc.

There are dozens of ways to estimate biomass without actually sampling it, but probably the best methods would involve double-sampling where you measure one parameter of the grassland and collect actual biomass in a sub-sample by cutting and weighing to generate an empirical relationship. I've used modified dry-weight rank to do that, harvesting 10 quadrats to generate the regression and then using that regression to estimate biomass for the remaining quadrats.

The disc pasture meter is widely used in southern Africa to estimate biomass, and you could select one of the many empirical relationships developed for different environments to estimate biomass in your environment. 

I've attached a spreadsheet that I compiled a few years ago of different discmeter regressions for different environments. The references for each relationship are included in the spreadsheet. These relationships only work for the design of the discmeter in the original Bransby and Tainton 1977 paper (included in the list). If you can't get a discmeter made to those exact specifications, you'll have to develop your own relationships for your own device (and it's probably better to generate your own relationships for your environment, anyway).

Alternatively, use measures such as leaf volume, leaf table height, modified dry-weight-rank, or remote sensing techniques. 

For the dry-weight rank methods, check the following references:

t’Mannetje, L., and K. P. Haydock. 1963. The dry-weight-rank method for the botanical analysis of pasture. Journal of the British Grassland Society 18:268–275.

Jones, R. M., and J. N. G. Hargreaves. 1979. Improvements to the dry-weight-rank method for measuring botanical composition. Grass and Forage Science 34:181–189.

Sandland, R. L., J. C. Alexander, and K. P. Haydock. 1982. A statistical assessment of the dry-weight-rank method of pasture sampling. Grass and Forage Science 37:263–272.

A phytomass volume index can be generated by multiplying cover (as a proportion) by leaf table height (as a proportion of maximum leaf table height). Double sampling can then be used to relate the index to biomass.

A couple of people have also developed relationships between grass cover and biomass. I have attached the Flombaum and Sala paper, and here is a reference to a response on that paper.

Montès, Nicolas. "A non-destructive method to estimate biomass in arid environments: A comment on Flombaun and Sala (200&." Journal of Arid Environments 73.6 (2009): 599-601.