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a USDA-ARS National Soil Tilth Lab., 2150 Pammel Dr., Ames, IA 50011 USA
b Dep. of Statistics, Iowa St. Univ., Ames, IA 50011 USA
cindyc{at}nstl.gov
| ABSTRACT |
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Abbreviations: frPOM, free and released particulate organic matter iPOM, intraaggregate particulate organic matter LSD, least significant difference POM, particulate organic matter
| INTRODUCTION |
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The cultivation of grassland soils results in a loss of soil organic matter and a deterioration in aggregate stability (Elliott, 1986; Gupta and Germida, 1988; Cambardella and Elliott, 1993). Cambardella and Elliott (1993) suggested that the decrease in aggregate stability in cultivated soils was related to a loss of POM in the soil. Puget et al. (1995) and Angers and Giroux (1996) reported that stable macroaggregates were enriched in newly deposited C relative to less stable macroaggregates and microaggregates, but the physical and chemical nature of this new C was not determined.
Golchin et al. (1994) isolated two POM fractions that were defined by their position in the soil matrix. Free POM (frPOM) was located between the soil aggregates and, because of its position in the soil, was not likely to contribute to the stability of aggregates. The second POM fraction, intraaggregate POM (iPOM), was occluded within aggregates and closely associated with mineral particles. In a followup study, Golchin et al. (1995) reported a strong correlation (
) between iPOM C and the stability of 1 to 2 mm aggregates isolated from paired, non-tilled, and cultivated soils from five different sites. These observations support the hypothesis that iPOM C is contributing to aggregate stability, however, we could find no reports in the literature that directly compared the concentration of new, iPOM C in stable and unstable aggregates of the same size.
Sieving methods and soil wetting pretreatments prior to sieving can have profound effects on the distribution of C among aggregate size fractions. Suddenly wetting a dry soil causes considerable disruption (slaking) of the soil structure as a result of internal pressure that builds up when air is trapped within the pore spaces of macroaggregates. Only highly stable macroaggregates are able to withstand these forces. In contrast, slowly wetting (e.g., vapor or capillary wetting) a soil prior to wet sieving allows the air to escape with minimal disruption of existing aggregates in the soil. The macroaggregate size classes obtained by the latter approach contain relatively unstable macroaggregates in addition to those that are highly stable. Overall, the stability of macroaggregates that survive capillary wetting is less than the stability of macroaggregates that survive slaking (Kemper and Rosenau, 1986; Cambardella and Elliott, 1993). A comparison of the characteristics of aggregates obtained from these two pretreatments may help in understanding the factors that influence aggregate stability.
In this paper, we report the results from a simulated no-till experiment that was designed to investigate the relative contributions of surface residue and in situ roots to soil organic matter. A combination of a 14C label, periodic sampling, and physical and chemical fractionation methods allowed us to monitor progressive changes with time in aggregation and the distribution of new, surface residue or root-derived C. A comparison of the two water pretreatments indicated that root-derived aggregate-14C and iPOM-14C concentrations were significantly higher in stable (slaking-resistant) small macroaggregates (252000 µm) relative to those in the capillary-wetted pretreatment. The specific objective of this study was to compare concentrations of new C in stable (slaking-resistant) macroaggregates with new C concentrations in macroaggregates isolated after capillary-wetting. We hypothesized that stable macroaggregates have higher concentrations of new POM C relative to less stable macroaggregates.
| Materials and methods |
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Soil Sampling
Three pots from each treatment were destructively sampled on Days 0, 90, 180, 270, and 360. After the surface residue was removed, the plastic pots were cut away, and the soil and roots were gently separated. Roots that were longer than
2 cm were removed by hand and rinsed with water, although most roots were clean when separated from the soil. The moist soil remaining in each pot was passed through an 8-mm sieve, air dried, and stored at room temperature.
Aggregate Separations
The air-dried 8-mm sieved soil from each pot was systematically mixed to ensure representative subsampling. Four 100-g subsamples of soil from each pot were removed for wet sieving and placed separately on filter paper (150-mm diam.; Whatman 1)1
in plastic petri dishes (140-mm diam.). Two subsamples were capillary wetted to 280 g H2O kg-1 by slowly adding water to the edges of the filter paper and allowing it to absorb into the soil. The other two subsamples were left to air dry. Samples from these treatments will be referred to as capillary-wetted and slaked, respectively. After the water pretreatments were applied, all four subsamples were placed in a refrigerator at 4°C overnight.
The four subsamples were wet sieved to obtain five aggregate size fractions (µm diameter): (i) >2000 (ii) 250 to 2000, (iii) 53 to 250, (iv) 20 to 53, and (v) <20. Soils were submerged in water on the 2000-µm sieve for 5 min before sieving. Soils were then sieved under water by moving the sieve 3 cm vertically 50 times during a period of 2 min, being careful to break the surface of the water with each stroke. The material retained on the sieve was backwashed into an aluminum pan. Soil plus water that passed through the sieve was poured on to the next finer sieve and the process repeated. The number of vertical movements was reduced to 35 times and 10 times for the 53- and 20-µm sieves, respectively. The soil slurry that passed through the 20-µm sieve was captured in a receiving pan. All size fractions were dried at 70°C. After drying, the duplicate samples from each pot were combined by size class and prewetting method. Subsamples from each of these treatment groupings were ground on a roller mill to pass a 250-µm sieve and stored at room temperature.
Fractionation of Organic Matter
The densiometric fractionation sequence used for the separation of frPOM and iPOM is given in Fig. 1
. By definition, POM is retained on a sieve with 53-µm openings (Cambardella and Elliott, 1992); therefore, this fractionation sequence was only applied to subsamples from the three largest aggregate size classes.
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Each sample was rinsed from the nylon filter into a 225-mL wide-mouth jar using 55 mL sodium polytungstate (Geoliquids Inc., Prospect Heights, IL) adjusted to a density of 1.89 g cm-3. A preliminary test showed that the water contained in the aggregates would lower the density of the polytungstate to 1.85 g cm-3. The samples were allowed to separate overnight at room temperature. On the following day, frPOM was aspirated from the surface of the liquid.
Separation of Intraaggregate Particulate Organic Matter
After removal of frPOM, we aspirated off as much of the polytungstate as possible and washed the aggregates into 250-mL polypropylene bottles with 175 mL of water. The samples were centrifuged at 900 x g for 10 min and the liquid was aspirated off. The soil pellet was rinsed into a 120 mL polypropylene bottle with 100 mL of 5 g L-1 sodium hexametaphosphate and shaken for 18 h on a reciprocal shaker (3.7-cm stroke length, 120 strokes min-1). The dispersed soil samples were passed through a 53-µm sieve and rinsed thoroughly with water. The material retained on the sieve was backwashed onto a 20-µm nylon filter and a vacuum was applied to remove excess water. Then, the material was rinsed with sodium polytungstate (1.85 g cm-3) into 100 mL beakers and the volume adjusted to 50 mL. The samples were allowed to separate overnight, and we then aspirated the iPOM floating on the surface of the liquid. The frPOM and iPOM fractions were separately washed with 300 mL of water on a 20-mm nylon filter, transferred to aluminum weighing pans and dried at 50°C. After drying, both fractions were ground to a fine powder in a ball mill and stored at room temperature.
Carbon and Nitrogen Determination
The amount of 14C in each fraction was measured by combusting subsamples in a Harvey Biological Oxidizer, model OX500 (R.J. Harvey Instrument Corp., Hillsdale, NJ). The 14C released during oxidation was trapped in Harvey's 14C cocktail and counted on a 1900 TR Liquid Scintillation Analyzer (Packard Instrument Co., Downers Grove, IL).
In order to make comparisons across aggregate size classes, C concentrations must first be corrected for sand content (Elliott et al., 1991). Microscopic examination of nonground, dispersed soil samples showed a large quantity of silt- to sand-size (2053 µm) mineral particles in this loess-derived soil. To determine the amount of mineral particles in each size class, we dispersed subsamples of each aggregate size class >20 µm with sodium hexametaphosphate as previously described and then passed the samples through a 20-µm sieve. The material that was retained on the sieve was dried, combusted for 24 h at 430°C to remove the organic matter, and weighed. All reported 14C concentrations are corrected for >20-µm mineral particles.
Statistical Analysis
Our experiment examined two treatment factors and was analyzed as a split plot. The whole plot factor was water pretreatment (capillary-wetted or slaked) prior to sieving. The aggregate size classes isolated for each water pretreatment were treated as subplots. Thus a total of 10 treatment combinations were measured on five dates (Day 0, 90, 180 270, and 360).
We used two statistical analyses corresponding to the major objectives of the study. First, changes in each variable across time (days) were characterized for each combination of water pretreatment and size class by using regression models that included linear and quadratic components. Second, to characterize differences between stable and unstable aggregates, we compared the mean for each aggregate size class in the slaked pretreatment with the corresponding mean in the capillary-wetted treatment by calculating values for the LSD (Steel and Torrie, 1997). We considered differences significant at
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| Results and discussion |
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Concentration of Carbon in Aggregates
Labeled Surface Residue Treatment
Surface residuederived aggregate-14C concentrations increased rapidly in all aggregate size classes between Days 0 and 90 (Table 2)
. In both the capillary-wetted and slaked pretreatments, macroaggregate-14C (>250-µm) concentrations tended to reach a maximum about Day 180 and then declined. The 14C concentrations in large and small microaggregates (53250 and 2053 µm) generally increased throughout the incubation. In both pretreatments, the concentration of surface residuederived 14C tended to be higher in large microaggregates (53250 µm) compared to the other aggregate size classes for all sample dates. Small microaggregates (2053 µm) generally had the second highest 14C concentration.
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The concentration of iPOM-14C followed a pattern similar to our observations for surface residuederived aggregate-14C (Table 3) . In both the capillary-wetted and slaked pretreatments, iPOM-14C concentrations of macroaggregates (>250 µm) generally increased until Day 180 and then declined. In large microaggregates (53250 µm), iPOM-14C increased significantly throughout the incubation. The concentration of iPOM-14C was 4.8 to 6.2 times higher in large microaggregates (53250 µm) compared to the other aggregate size classes in the capillary-wetted treatment. In the slaked treatment, the concentration of iPOM-14C also tended to be higher in the large microaggregates (53250 µm) compared with small macroaggregates (2502000 µm). The iPOM-14C concentration of small macroaggregates (2502000 µm) was not significantly different in the slaked compared to capillary-wetted treatment. This suggests that surface residuederived iPOM C was not a primary factor in the formation and stabilization of small macroaggregates.
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Labeled (roots + soil) Treatment
Water pretreatment prior to sieving strongly influenced the concentration of root-derived, aggregate-14C in different size classes (Table 4)
. In the capillary-wetted treatment, 14C concentrations were higher in large microaggregates (53250 µm) compared to other aggregate size classes, whereas large macroaggregates (>2000 µm) had the lowest 14C concentration. In contrast, aggregate-14C concentrations tended to decline with aggregate size in the slaked treatment.
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The concentration of root-derived 14C in most aggregate size fractions changed significantly with time (Table 4). For example, there was a significant decrease in the concentration of root-derived aggregate-14C in small macroaggregates (2502000 µm) in both pretreatments. In contrast, the concentration of root-derived 14C in large microaggregates (53250 µm) increased significantly with time. These results agree with Angers et al. (1997) who observed that, when labeled wheat (Triticum aestivum L.)straw was incorporated into the soil, the concentration of newly added C in macroaggregates was initially high and then declined, but the concentration of new C in microaggregates increased with time.
Root-derived iPOM-14C concentrations followed patterns similar to those which we previously described for aggregate-14C (Table 5) . In both treatments, the concentration of iPOM-14C decreased significantly with time in small macroaggregates (2502000 µm), but increased with time in large microaggregates (53250 µm). In the capillary-wetted treatment, iPOM-14C concentrations were higher in large microaggregates (53250 µm) compared to macroaggregates (>250 µm) on all sample dates except Day 0. In the slaked treatment, small macroaggregates (250 2000 µm) had higher iPOM-14C concentrations than large microaggregates (53250 µm).
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| Conclusions |
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| NOTES |
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Received for publication June 30, 1998.
| REFERENCES |
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