Abstract: In order to explore the effects of land management on the carbon catabolic characteristics of soil microorganisms，the carbon catabolic characters and community structure of soil bacteria in different periods about‘Hanfu’apple orchard with the herbage-mulching management was investigated in this study. The results showed that the amount and ability for soil bacteria to use carbon sources in June and July were significantly higher than that in April，May，August and September. Compared to clean tillage treatment，the herbage-mulching treatment decreased 1 strain of dominant bacteria in April，increased 1 strain in September，and showed no differences from May to August. In general，dominan tbacterial strains isolated from the herbage-mulching treatment obviously enhanced the ability to utilize carbohydrates（such as sucrose，glucose and starch），ethonhol inols（such as sorbitol and inositol），and amino acids（such as aspartic acid and leucine） in the different periods except for April. The analysis of 16S rDNA sequence showed that 53.8% of the dominant bacteria belonged to Bacillus，which existed in most of the tested soils. Alcaligenes，Pseudomonas and Firmicutes would also become the dominant genera in different tested soils because of the influences of different seasons and different management measures. Compared to the soil sampled in April，May，August and September，in the soil sampled in June and July two dominant genera including Alcaligenes and Firmicutes were increased；And compared to the clean tillage，the herbage-mulching treatment increased Firmicutes and some uncultured soil bacteria in July.

Key words: apple, orchard, herbage-mulch, soil microbe, carbon catabolism, community structure