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Weed control increases nitrogen retranslocation and growth of white spruce seedlings on a reclaimed oil sands soil

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Abstract

Early establishment of seedlings in reclaimed oil sand areas is often limited by low nutrient and water availability due to factors such as strong understory vegetation competition. Management practices such as nursery fertilization and field weed control could help early establishment of planted seedlings and reclamation success. We investigated the effect of nursery nutrient loading and field weed control on the growth, nitrogen (N) retranslocation within seedling components, and plant N uptake from the soil for white spruce (Picea glauca [Moench] Voss) seedlings planted on a highly competitive reclaimed oil sands site for two years. Exponential fertilization during nursery production increased the root biomass but not the nutrient reserve in the seedling. In the field experiment, on average across the treatments, 78 and 49% of the total N demand of new tissue growth in the first and second year were met by N retranslocation, respectively. Though exponential fertilization did not affect N retranslocation, it increased the percent height and root collar diameter growth. Weed control increased not only the growth of seedlings by increasing soil N availability, but also N retranslocation within the seedlings in the second year after outplanting. We conclude that vegetation management by weed control is feasible in improving the early growth of white spruce seedlings planted on reclaimed soils and facilitate tree establishment in the oil sands region. Optimization of the nursery exponential N fertilization regime for white spruce may further help with early revegetation of reclaimed oil sands sites.

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Acknowledgements

We would like to thank the Land Reclamation International Graduate School (LRIGS), which was funded through a CREATE (Collaborative Research and Training Experience) grant from the National Science and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC), for financial support in the form of a fellowship to the senior author and the Environmental Reclamation Research Group (ERRG) of the Canadian Oil Sands Network for Research and Development (CONRAD) for funding this research. We would like to acknowledge Suncor Energy Inc. for logistic support. We would also like to thank Dr. Jin Hyeob Kwak, Ms. Kangyi Lou and Ms. Stephanie Ibsen for their great help in field and laboratory work and Drs. Francis Salifu, Phil Comeau, Douglass Jacobs, Xiao Tan and Carmela Arevalo for discussions and guidance.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Renewable Resources, University of Alberta, 442 Earth Sciences Building, Edmonton, T6G 2E3, Canada

    Prem Pokharel, Ghulam M. Jamro & Scott X. Chang

  2. Department of Rural & Biosystems Engineering, Chonnam National University, Gwangju, 500-757, Republic of Korea

    Woo-Jung Choi

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  1. Prem Pokharel
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  2. Woo-Jung Choi
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  4. Scott X. Chang
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Correspondence to Scott X. Chang.

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Pokharel, P., Choi, WJ., Jamro, G.M. et al. Weed control increases nitrogen retranslocation and growth of white spruce seedlings on a reclaimed oil sands soil. New Forests 48, 699–717 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11056-017-9593-5

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