Yanting Agricultural Ecological Station on Purple Soil - China

Yanting Agro-ecological Experimental Station of Purple Soil of CAS locates at LinShan, Yanting (105 º 27 'E, 31 º 16' N) in the north-central Sichuan Basin. It was established in 1980 and became a member of the Chinese Ecosystem Research Network (CERN) in 1991. In 2005, it was selected to be a National Key Field Research Station. In 2007, the Station became one of the Soil and Water Conservation Sci-Tech Demonstration Zones under the Ministry of Water Resources. It is also one of the observatory sites of Global Terrestrial Observation System (GTOS) and a key field station under the Ministry of Agriculture. Yanting has a humid subtropical monsoon climate, with an annual average temperature of 17.5 ℃ and an average annual rainfall of 826 mm, and its annual frost-free period is averagely 290 days. Its landscape is featured by hills. The outcropped rock strata are purplish sand-mudstones formed in Jurassic and Cretaceous period. The soil is called locally purple soil. It is classified as Eutric Regosols in the FAO Soil Taxonomy and as Pup-Orthic-Entisols in the Chinese Soil Taxonomy. Yanting Station represents typical farmland ecosystems dominated by purple soils in the Sichuan Basin in the subtropical region.