Abstract
Key message
Tissue Na and Cl concentrations can be used for estimation of salt injury for white spruce, black spruce, and jack pine growing at salt affected areas.
Abstract
Elevated soil salinity is among the most challenging environmental factors affecting plant growth and survival. Due to the widespread salinity concerns in agricultural soils, most of the salinity research has been carried out with agricultural crop plants. However, salinity is also frequently a factor affecting the sites reclaimed following surface mining including the oil sands mining areas located in the boreal forest of the northeastern Alberta, Canada. The present study examined the relationship between NaCl uptake, tissue Na and Cl concentrations, and plant injury in seedlings of three conifer species, which are commonly used for oil sands reclamation including black spruce (Picea mariana), white spruce (Picea glauca), and jack pine (Pinus banksiana). The seedlings were grown under controlled-environment conditions in sand culture and were subjected to 0 (control), 30, 60, and 90 mM NaCl treatments. Compared with control, stem diameters and shoot heights of black spruce, white spruce, and jack pine seedlings were significantly reduced by all NaCl treatments. White spruce and jack pine also exhibited reduced total dry weights. Needle chlorophyll concentrations decreased under NaCl treatments in all species. Visible symptoms of salt injury were observed in young and old needles of seedlings treated with NaCl. Significant needle necrosis was present in all species subjected to the 90 mM NaCl treatment. We found significant correlation between needle Na and Cl concentrations and necrosis extent. Therefore, we propose using the tissue Na and Cl concentration as an effective monitoring tool to estimate salt injury of conifers grown in NaCl-affected areas.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Allen JA, Chambers JL, Stine M (1994) Prospects for increasing the salt tolerance of forest trees: a review. Tree Physiol 14:843–853
Allen JA, Pezeshki SR, Chambers JL (1996) Interaction of flooding and salinity stress on baldcypress (Taxodium distichum). Tree Physiol 16:307–313
Apostol KG, Zwiazek JJ, MacKinnon M (2002) NaCl and Na2SO4 alter responses of jack pine (Pinus banksiana Lamb.) seedlings to boron. Plant Soil 240:321–329
Banuls J, Legaz F, Primo-Millo E (1990) Effect of salinity on uptake and distribution of chloride and sodium in some citrus scion-rootstock combinations. J Hortic Sci 65:715–724
Boursier P, Lynch J, Lauchli A, Epstein E (1987) Chloride partitioning in leaves of salt-stressed sorghum, maize, wheat and barley. Funct Plant Biol 14:463–473
Broadley M, Brown P, Cakmak I, Rengel Z, Zhao F (2012) Function of nutrients: micronutrients. In: Marschner P (ed) Marschner’s mineral nutrition of higher plants. Academic Press, London, pp 191–248
Calvo-Polanco M, Sanchez-Romera B, Aroca R (2014) Mild salt stress conditions induce different responses in root hydraulic conductivity of Phaseolus vulgaris over-time. PLoS One 9:e90631. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0090631
Calvo-Polanco M, Zhang W, Macdonald SE, Señorans J, Zwiazek JJ (2017) Boreal forest plant species responses to pH: ecological interpretation and application to reclamation. Plant Soil 420:195–208
Davenport R, James RA, Zakrisson-Plogander A, Tester M, Munns R (2005) Control of sodium transport in durum wheat. Plant Physiol 137:807–818
Epstein E (1972) Mineral nutrition of plants: principles and perspectives. Wiley, New York, p 412
Fostad O, Pedersen PA (2000) Container-grown tree seedling responses to sodium chloride applications in different substrates. Environ Pollut 109:203–210
Franklin JA, Zwiazek JJ (2004) Ion uptake in Pinus banksiana treated with sodium chloride and sodium sulphate. Physiol Plant 120:482–490
Franklin JA, Renault S, Croser C, Zwiazek JJ, McKinnon M (2002) Jack pine growth and elemental composition is affected by saline tailings water. J Environ Qual 31:648–653
Gowda VR, Henry A, Yamauchi A, Shashidhar H, Serraj R (2011) Root biology and genetic improvement for drought avoidance in rice. Field Crop Res 122:1–13
Grossnickle SC (1987) Influence of flooding and soil temperature on the water relations and morphological development of cold-stored black spruce and white spruce seedlings. Can J For Res 17:821–828
Howat D (2000) Acceptable salinity, sodicity and pH values for boreal forest reclamation. Report #ESD/LM/00-2. Alberta Environment, Environmental Sciences Division, Edmonton, p 191
Jacoby B (1994) Mechanisms involved in salt tolerance by plants. In: Pessarakli M (ed) Handbook of plant and crop stress. Marcel Dekker, New York, pp 97–124
Jimenez-Casas M, Zwiazek JJ (2013) Effects of branch pruning and seedling size on total transpiration and tissue Na and Cl accumulation in Pinus leiophylla seedlings exposed to salinity. For Sci 59:407–415
Läuchli A, Grattan SR (2007) Plant growth and development under salinity stress. Advances in molecular breeding toward drought and salt tolerant crops. Springer, Dordrecht, pp 1–32
Marcar N, Termaat A (1990) Effects of root-zone solutes on Eucalyptus camaldulensis and Eucalyptus bicostata seedlings: responses to Na+, Mg2+ and Cl. Plant Soil 125:245
Martin PK, Koebner RMK (1995) Sodium and chloride ions contribute synergistically to salt toxicity in wheat. Biol Plant 37:265–271
Munns R (2002) Comparative physiology of salt and water stress. Plant Cell Environ 25:239–250
Munns R, Tester M (2008) Mechanisms of salinity tolerance. Annu Rev Plant Biol 59:651–681
Nguyen H, Polanco MC, Zwiazek JJ (2006) Gas exchange and growth responses of ectomycorrhizal Picea mariana, Picea glauca, and Pinus banksiana seedlings to NaCl and Na2SO4. Plant Biol 8:646–652. https://doi.org/10.1055/s-2006-924106
Nienstaedt H, Zasada JC (1990) Picea glauca (Moench) Voss. In: Burns RM, Honkala BH (eds) Silvics of North America. Conifers. Agriculture handbook, vol 1. USDA, Forest Service, Washington
Parida AK, Das AB (2005) Salt tolerance and salinity effects on plants: a review. Ecotoxicol Environ Saf 60:324–349
Polanco MC, Zwiazek JJ, Jones MD, MacKinnon MD (2008) Responses of mycorrhizal jack pine (Pinus banksiana) seedlings to NaCl and boron. Trees Struct Funct 22:825–834
Renault S (2005) Tamarack response to salinity: effects of sodium chloride on growth and ion, pigment, and soluble carbohydrate levels. Can J For Res 35:2806–2812
Renault S, Lait C, Zwiazek JJ, MacKinnon MD (1998) Effect of high salinity tailings waters produced from gypsum treatment of sand tailings on plants of the boreal forest. Environ Pollut 102:177–184
Renault S, Zwiazek JJ, Fung M, Tuttle S (2000) Germination, growth and gas exchange of selected boreal forest seedlings in soil containing oil sands tailings. Environ Pollut 107:357–365
Renault S, Croser C, Franklin JA, Zwiazek JJ (2001) Effects of NaCl and Na2SO4 on red-osier dogwood (Cornus stolonifera Michx) seedlings. Plant Soil 233:261–268
Sestak Z, Catský J, Jarvis PG (1971) Plant photosynthetic production: manual of methods. Dr. W. Junk Publishers, The Hague
Shabala S, Munns R (2017) Salinity stress: physiological constraints and adaptive mechanisms. In: Shabala S (ed) Plant stress physiology, 2nd edn. CAB International, Wallingford, pp 24–63
Sykes S (1993) The inheritance of salt exclusion in woody perennial fruit species. In: Genetic aspects of plant mineral nutrition. Springer, pp 165–171
Tanou G, Molassiotis A, Diamantidis G (2009) Induction of reactive oxygen species and necrotic death-like destruction in strawberry leaves by salinity. Environ Exp Bot 65:270–281
Tester M, Davenport R (2003) Na+ tolerant and Na+ transport in higher plants. Ann Bot 91:503–527
Zhang W, Zwiazek JJ (2016) Responses of reclamation plants to high root zone pH: effects of phosphorus and calcium availability. J Environ Qual 45:1652–1662. https://doi.org/10.2134/jeq2016.01.0026
Acknowledgements
We would like to thank Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC), and Canada’s Oil Sands Innovation Alliance (COSIA) for the financial support.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Conflict of interest
The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.
Additional information
Communicated by R Guy.
Publisher's Note
Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Olivier, S., Zhang, WQ. & Zwiazek, J.J. Tissue sodium and chloride concentrations in relation to needle injury in boreal conifer seedlings subjected to salt stress. Trees 34, 521–529 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00468-019-01933-3
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00468-019-01933-3