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Response of Buried Mineral Soil Bags to Experimental Acidification of Forest Ecosystem

Faculty of Environmental and Forest Biology, SUNY-College of Environmental Science and Forestry, Syracuse, NY 13210

M. B. David

Dep. of Forestry, Univ. of Illinois, Urbana, IL 61801

I. J. Fernandez and L. E. Rustad

Dep. of Plant, Soil and Environmental Science, Univ. of Maine, Orono, ME 04469

R. D. Fuller

Center for Earth and Environmental Science, SUNY-Plattsburgh, Plattsburgh, NY 12901

K. Nadelhoffer

Ecosystems Center, Marine Biological Lab., Woods Hole, MA 02543

*Corresponding author.

ABSTRACT

At Bear Brook Watershed in Maine, H₂SO₄ and/or HNO₃ was added to 15 by 15 m plots (three replicates per treatment) from 1988 through 1990. Total loading above ambient treatments for the 3 yr was 0 (control), 5100 (low S, low N), 10 200 (high S and N + S), and 11 950 (high N) mol_c ha^–1 yr^–1. Changes in soil chemistry were evaluated using tension lysimeters and buried mineral soil bags placed below the forest floor before treatments were initiated. Total soil S was highest in the high S treatment (355 mg S kg^–1 soil), intermediate in the low S and N + S treatments (314 and 310 mg S kg^–1 soil, respectively), and lowest in the low N, high N, and control treatments (278, 275, and 270 mg S kg^–1 soil, respectively). Differences in total S were mostly attributed to phosphate-extractable SO₄, although smaller changes in ester sulfate and C-bonded S were also detected. Low pH and elevated SO₄ in solution resulted in increased SO₄ in solution resulted in increased SO₄ adsorption. There were no differences caused by treatments in N or C constituents in the soil bags, although N was strongly linked with C (r = 0.86). Nitric and sulfuric acid additions lowered soil pH (H₂O) from 4.83 in the control to 4.67 and 4.70, respectively. Sulfuric acid treatments increased exchangeable Ca to 0.32 cmol_c kg^–1 compared with 0.24 cmol_c kg^–1 in the control, whereas HNO₃ treatments decreased Ca to 0.18 cmol_c kg^–1. A strong correlation (r = 0.94) between exchangeable Ca and base saturation reflected the quantitative dominance of exchangeable Ca among base cations. Similarities in effects of the N + S and the low S treatments were due to identical additions of SO₄ and the absence of a marked effect of NO₃ additions on the mineral soil. Changes in the chemistry of the buried mineral soil bags can be explained by both the effects of H₂SO₄ and HNO₃ additions as well as pedogenic processes.

Received for publication December 22, 1992.

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