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Short‐term changes in δ 13 C and δ 15 N signatures of water discharged from grazed grasslands
Author(s) -
McTiernan Kevin B.,
Jarvis Stephen C.,
Allen Deborah,
Bol Roland,
Scholefield David
Publication year - 1999
Publication title -
rapid communications in mass spectrometry
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.528
H-Index - 136
eISSN - 1097-0231
pISSN - 0951-4198
DOI - 10.1002/(sici)1097-0231(19990930)13:18<1803::aid-rcm718>3.0.co;2-m
Subject(s) - lysimeter , grassland , soil water , chemistry , organic matter , delta , surface runoff , storm , dissolved organic carbon , soil organic matter , hydrology (agriculture) , environmental science , soil science , environmental chemistry , agronomy , ecology , geology , oceanography , geotechnical engineering , organic chemistry , engineering , biology , aerospace engineering
The composition of dissolved organic matter (DOM) in a soil is the product of a variety of soil processes. Changes in the composition of DOM in water discharged from soil should, therefore, give an important insight into modifications in these soil processes. We hypothesise that these processes in soils, under different grassland management regimes, would be affected to different extents by the short‐term disturbance of a storm event and that evidence of this could be detected in δ 13 C and δ 15 N signatures in drainage and surface runoff waters. During a storm event we collected discharge waters from 1 ha grassland lysimeters, with or without artificial drainage, which received contrasting fertiliser inputs, and δ 13 C and δ 15 N signatures were determined. Changes in 13 C enrichment during the storm event were clearly identifiable, as were differences between plots for 13 C and 15 N, illustrating that this technique has potential to be a useful tool for identifying and investigating short‐ and long‐term changes in soil organic matter dynamics. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.