Caragana microphylla has been widespread in Inner Mongolia steppe, and therefore it can strongly influence the small-scale heterogenity of soil resources. Caragena microphylla could form a patch through the clonal growth in the degraded steppe. A patch with different size could be viewed as its distinct development stage. Therefore, we could infer the dynamics of small-scale heterogeneity of the SOC and STN associated with Caragena microphylla in Inner Mongolia degraded steppe, by analyzing the distribution of SOC and STN associated with a series of shrub patches.
Results showed that, for 0～5cm，5～10cm，and 10～20cm soil depths, Caragana microphylla could induce the spatial heterogeneity of SOC and STN at small-scale associated with shrub patches, and this heterogeneity tended to increase as a shrub patch developed, especially it rose fastest for the surficial 0～5cm soil depth，which is showed that the increment of the SOC and STN in the 0～5cm soil depths, for the inside relative to the outside (or the edge) of shrub patches, was increased significantly with a shrub patch expanding. It suggested that the small-scale heterogeneity of the SOC and STN associated with Caragana microphylla has a self-reinforcing process as a shrub patch expanded, in Inner Mongolia degraded steppe.