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Variability of Plant and Surface Soil Carbon Concentration Among Saltmarsh Habitats in Ireland

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Abstract

Saltmarshes are disproportionally efficient at sequestering C into their substrates and thus help to mitigate climate change but are declining globally because of human pressures. Accurately assessing their C storage capacity to inform coastal management is important, but variability among saltmarsh vegetation types is rarely investigated explicitly. Using field surveys across 15 Irish saltmarshes, we characterised C concentration variability among plant assemblages, in above- and below-ground plant parts, surface soil (upper 10 cm; indicative of the accumulation rate of particular vegetation communities, as opposed to the full depth profile aggregated throughout the different successional stages) and their three combined pools. We also assessed if environmental data can improve C models. We found between 2- and 17-fold variability in C concentration among the vegetation classes. Increasing the resolution of vegetation classification usually improved our C models. C concentration in most pools increased with elevation and decreased with the proportion of sand in the soil, whereas soil salinity was not influential. Biological and environmental variables alone were sufficient to predict above-ground plant C and soil C, respectively, but for below-ground plant C their combination was best. Not accounting for any vegetation heterogeneity within and among saltmarshes can introduce error in C inventories.

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Acknowledgements

This study was supported by the Environmental Protection Agency (Ireland) under a Small Scale Study Grant (2018-CCRP-SS.25) and the SAMFHIRES project (2015-W-MS-19). We thank the reviewers and associate editor for their helpful comments.

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  1. Department of Zoology and Trinity Centre for the Environment, Trinity College Dublin, Dublin 2, Ireland

    Marcin R. Penk

  2. Botanical, Environmental and Conservation Consultants, 65 Holywell, Dublin 14, Ireland

    Marcin R. Penk & Philip M. Perrin

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Correspondence to Marcin R. Penk.

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Penk, M.R., Perrin, P.M. Variability of Plant and Surface Soil Carbon Concentration Among Saltmarsh Habitats in Ireland. Estuaries and Coasts 45, 1631–1645 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12237-021-01042-w

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