The Effect of Wildfire on Soil Mercury Concentrations in Southern California Watersheds

نویسندگان

  • Megan P. Burke
  • Terri S. Hogue
  • Marcia Ferreira
  • Carolina B. Mendez
  • Bridget Navarro
  • Sonya Lopez
  • Jennifer A. Jay
چکیده

Mercury (Hg) stored in vegetation and soils is known to be released to the atmosphere during wildfires, increasing atmospheric stores and altering terrestrial budgets. Increased erosion and transport of sediments is well-documented in burned watersheds, both immediately post-fire and as the watershed recovers; however, understanding post-fire mobilization of soil Hg within burned watersheds remains elusive. The goal of the current study is to better understand the impact of wildfire on soil-bound Hg during the immediate post-fire period as well as during recovery, in order to assess the potential for sediment-driven transport to and within surface waters in burned watersheds. Soils were collected from three southern California watersheds of similar vegetation and soil characteristics that experienced wildfire. Sampling in one of these watersheds was extended for several seasons (1.5 years) in order to investigate temporal changes in soil Hg concentrations. Laboratory analysis included bulk soil total Hg concentrations and total organic carbon of burned and unburned samples. Soils were also fractionated into a subset of grain sizes with analysis of Hg on each fraction. Low Hg concentrations were observed in surface soils immediately post-fire. Accumulation of Hg coincident with moderate vegetative recovery was observed in the burned surface soils 1 year following the fire, and mobilization was also noted during the second winter (rainy) season. Hg concentrations were highest in the fine-grained fraction of unburned soils; however, in the burned soils, the distribution of soil-bound Hg was less influenced by grain size. The accelerated accumulation of Hg observed in the burned soils, along with the elevated risk of erosion, could result in increased delivery of organic- or particulate-bound Hg to surface waters in post-fire systems.

برای دانلود متن کامل این مقاله و بیش از 32 میلیون مقاله دیگر ابتدا ثبت نام کنید

ثبت نام

اگر عضو سایت هستید لطفا وارد حساب کاربری خود شوید

منابع مشابه

Latent effect of soil organic matter oxidation on mercury cycling within a southern boreal ecosystem.

The focus of this study is to investigate processes causing the observed spatial variation of total mercury (THg) in the soil O horizon of watersheds within the Superior National Forest (Minnesota) and to determine if results have implications toward understanding long-term changes in THg concentrations for resident fish. Principal component analysis was used to evaluate the spatial relationshi...

متن کامل

Predicting Background and Risk-based Sedimentation for Forest Watershed Tmdls

The Water Erosion Prediction Project (WEPP) model is a physically-based soil erosion tool developed to predict runoff and erosion. Databases for forest soil, vegetation, and climate conditions have been developed. Background sediment may be generated annually from undisturbed forests, and occasionally following wildfire. In some cases, it may be appropriate to include sediment from essential fo...

متن کامل

Pre- and post-fire pollutant loads in an urban fringe watershed in Southern California.

Post-fire runoff has the potential to be a large source of contaminants to downstream areas. However, the magnitude of this effect in urban fringe watersheds adjacent to large sources of airborne contaminants is not well documented. The current study investigates the impacts of wildfire on stormwater contaminant loading from the upper Arroyo Seco watershed, burned in 2009. This watershed is adj...

متن کامل

Investigation of the effect of climate change on runoff curve number by using GIS and RS (case study: Mansourabad and Navroud watersheds)

  Application of gepraphic information system and image processing in evaluation of surface runoff of a watershed in recent years has increased greatly. In the study , the runoff curve number map was prepared using geographic information system (GIS)and Landsat Sattelite Images (ETM+)for two watersheds of Mansourabad in southern Khorasan province and Navroud in Gilan province based on the facto...

متن کامل

Comparing the Influence of Wildfire and Prescribed Burns on Watershed Nitrogen Biogeochemistry Using 15N Natural Abundance in Terrestrial and Aquatic Ecosystem Components

We evaluated differences in the effects of three low-severity spring prescribed burns and four wildfires on nitrogen (N) biogeochemistry in Rocky Mountain headwater watersheds. We compared paired (burned/unburned) watersheds of four wildfires and three spring prescribed burns for three growing seasons post-fire. To better understand fire effects on the entire watershed ecosystem, we measured N ...

متن کامل

ذخیره در منابع من


  با ذخیره ی این منبع در منابع من، دسترسی به آن را برای استفاده های بعدی آسان تر کنید

برای دانلود متن کامل این مقاله و بیش از 32 میلیون مقاله دیگر ابتدا ثبت نام کنید

ثبت نام

اگر عضو سایت هستید لطفا وارد حساب کاربری خود شوید

عنوان ژورنال:

دوره 212  شماره 

صفحات  -

تاریخ انتشار 2010