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- Title
Nitrate leaching from a sub-alpine coniferous forest subjected to experimentally increased N deposition for 20 years, and effects of tree girdling and felling.
- Authors
Schleppi, Patrick; Curtaz, Fabienne; Krause, Kim
- Abstract
Increased nitrogen (N) deposition rates were simulated for 20 years (1995-2015) by sprinkling rain water enriched with NHNO (+22 kg ha year N) in a small headwater catchment within a spruce ( Picea abies) forest at Alptal (central Switzerland). The added N was labelled with NHNO during the first year. A control catchment was labelled in years 6 and 8. NO leaching doubled in the N-addition catchment during the first year, resulting almost entirely from loss of N-labelled NO . The proportion of added N leached as NO -N reached 1/3 after 5 years, then remained stable for the next 10 years, at 6.6-10 kg ha year compared with 1.4-2.9 kg ha year in the control catchment. In each catchment, half of the large trees were girdled during the 15th year and felled 1 year later to assess their role in soil N retention. Girdling and felling resulted in a strong increase in NO -N leaching from the N-addition catchment (up to 19 kg ha year). The increase was significantly smaller in the control (up to 4 kg ha year). NO leached after tree girdling contained only 0.18% of the originally applied tracer in the control and none detectable in the N-addition catchment. The increased leaching was thus mainly from new N and due to reduced N immobilisation by trees rather than to increased N mineralisation and nitrification in the soil. Dissolved organic N leaching (average 6.1 kg ha year), in contrast, was unaffected by the treatment.
- Subjects
NITROGEN; NITRIC oxide; ORGANIC compounds; WATERSHEDS; TREE girdling; FOREST management
- Publication
Biogeochemistry, 2017, Vol 134, Issue 3, p319
- ISSN
0168-2563
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1007/s10533-017-0364-3