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Dissolved Organic Carbon Concentrations in Throughfall and Soil Waters at Level II Monitoring Plots in Norway: Short- and Long-Term Variations

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Abstract

We investigated concentrations of dissolved organic carbon (DOC) in throughfall and soil solutions at 5, 15 and 40-cm depth in 16 Norway spruce and two Scots pine plots throughout Norway between 1996 and 2006. Average DOC concentrations ranged from 2.3 to 23.1 mg/l and from 1.1 to 53.5 mg/l in throughfall water and soil solutions, respectively. Concentrations of DOC in throughfall and soil waters varied seasonally at most plots with peaks in the growing season. By contrast to recently reported positive long-term trends in DOC concentrations in surface waters between 1986 and 2003, soil water data from 1996 to 2006 showed largely negative trends in DOC concentrations and no significant trends in throughfall. However, regression analysis for individual sites, particularly at 5- and 15-cm soil depths, showed that DOC concentrations in soil water were significantly and negatively related to non-marine sulphate (SO4) and chloride (Cl−). The lack of a long-term increase in DOC in soil water in the period May 1996–December 2006 may be due to the relatively small changes in the deposition of SO4 and Cl− in this period.

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Acknowledgements

This work was financed by the Norwegian Ministries of Agriculture and the Environment. We would like to thank our technical staff for setting up and maintaining the plots, the local observers of the Norwegian Monitoring Programme for Forest Damage for collecting the samples, the Analytical Laboratory of the Norwegian Forest Research Institute for chemical analysis and the Norwegian Meteorological Institute for providing data for MAT and MAP.

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  1. Norwegian Forest and Landscape Institute, P. O. Box 115, 1431, Ås, Norway

    Yijie Wu & Nicholas Clarke

  2. Department of Plant and Environmental Sciences, Norwegian University of Life Sciences, P. O. Box 5003, 1432, Ås, Norway

    Jan Mulder

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  1. Yijie Wu
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Correspondence to Yijie Wu.

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Wu, Y., Clarke, N. & Mulder, J. Dissolved Organic Carbon Concentrations in Throughfall and Soil Waters at Level II Monitoring Plots in Norway: Short- and Long-Term Variations. Water Air Soil Pollut 205, 273–288 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11270-009-0073-1

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