Abstract
Normal seed germination of native herbaceous species can be reduced by high concentrations of deicer products and their constituent salts. Chloride salts are commonly used during the winter months in temperate climates to remove ice and snow. Although these products greatly improve driving conditions, they can have detrimental effects on the vegetation growing along highways. The purpose of this laboratory study was to determine the impact of a magnesium-based deicer product and a sodium-based deicer product and the major salts they contain on the germination and viability of several species of grasses and forbs native to Colorado and planted in revegetation seedings there. Seeds were placed on blotter paper saturated with either a water control, one of three concentrations of each of the deicing solutions, or one of three concentrations of a pure NaCl or MgCl2 solution. Increasing concentrations of salt ions generally resulted in delayed and reduced normal seed germination, especially the sodium- and magnesium-based deicer solutions. Germination for most species was lower when seeds were grown in deicer solution compared with germination percent of seeds grown in the pure salt solutions. Some species were more tolerant of one of the salts and deicers. Species with C4 photosynthetic pathway were more tolerant than C3 species of high concentrations of both deicer products. Those species which attained the highest germination percent under moderate or high solution concentrations included blue grama, buffalograss, little bluestem, mountain brome, and slender wheatgrass.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Addo J. Q., Chenard, M., Sanders, T. G. (2004). Road dust suppression: effect on maintenance, stability, safety and the environment (phases 1-3). Mountain Plains Consortium, Report Number: MPC-04-156.
Association of Official Seed Analysts (AOSA) (2009). Seed vigor testing handbook. Ithaca, NY.
Association of Official Seed Analysts (AOSA) (2010). AOSA rules for testing seeds. Ithaca, NY.
Bowman, D. C., Devitt, D. A., & Miller, W. W. (2000). The effect of salinity on filtrate leaching from tall rescue turfgrass. ACS Symposium Series, 743, 164–178.
Carrow, R. N., & Duncan, R. R. (1998). Salt affected turfgrass sites: assessment and management. Chelsea, MI: Ann Arbor Press.
Colorado Department of Agriculture (2012). Colorado’s noxious weeds, noxious weed management program. http://www.colorado.gov/cs/Satellite/Agriculture-Main/CDAG/1174084048733.
Colorado Department of Transportation (2012). Winter maintenance FAQs. http://www.coloradodot.info/travel/winter-driving/faqs.html.
Dobson, M. C. (1991). De-icing salt damage to trees and shrubs. Forest Communications Bulletin, 101, 1–64.
Ervin, E. H., & Koski, A. J. (1998). Drought avoidance aspects and crop coefficients of Kentucky bluegrass and tall fescue turfs in the semiarid West. Crop Science, 38, 788–795.
Fischer, M. (2001). Evaluation of selected deicers based on a review of the literature. Colorado Department of Transportation. Report No CDOT-DTD-R-2001-15. Denver, CO.
Galuszka, A., Migaszewski, Z. M., Podlaski, R., Dołegowska, S., & Michalik, A. (2011). The influence of chloride deicers on mineral nutrition and the health status of roadside trees in the city of Kielce, Poland. Environmental Monitoring and Assessment, 176, 451–464.
Goodrich, B. A., Koski, R. D., & Jacobi, W. R. (2009). Condition of soils and vegetation along roads treated with magnesium chloride for dust suppression. Water Air and Soil Pollution, 198, 165–188.
Hall, R., Hofstra, G., & Lumis, G. P. (1972). Effects of deicing salt on eastern white pine: foliar injury, growth suppression and seasonal changes in foliar concentrations of sodium and chloride. Canadian Journal of Forest Resources, 2, 244–249.
Environment Canada and Health Canada (2001). Canadian Environmental Protection Act 1999. Priority substances list assessment report: road salts.
Hofstra, G., & Hall, R. (1971). Injury on roadside trees: leaf injury on pine and white cedar in relation to foliar levels of sodium and chloride. Canadian Journal of Botany, 49, 613–622.
Hofstra, G., Hall, R., & Lumis, G. P. (1979). Studies of salt induced damage to roadside plants in Ontario. Journal of Arboriculture, 5, 25–31.
Kramer, P. J., & Boyer, J. S. (1995). Water relations of plants and soils. New York: Academic Press.
Liu, J., Guo, W. Q., & Shi, D. C. (2010). Seed germination, seedling survival, and physiological response of sunflowers under saline and alkaline conditions. Photosynthetica, 48, 278–286.
McCarty, L. B., & Dudeck, A. E. (1993). Salinity effects on bentgrass germination. HortScience, 28, 15–17.
Mintenko, A., & Smith, R. (2001). Native grasses vary in salinity tolerance. Golf Course Management, 69, 55–59.
USDA NRCS (USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service) (2010). The PLANTS Database National Plant Data Center. http://www.plants.usda.gov/java. Accessed 13 March 2013.
Qi, M. Q., & Redmann, R. E. (1993). Seed germination and seedling survival of C3 and C4 grasses under water stress. Journal of Arid Environments, 24, 277–285.
Qian, Y. L., Koski, A. J., & Welton, R. (2001). Amending isolite and zeolite in sand under saline conditions: leachate composition and salt deposition. HortScience, 36, 717–720.
Qian, Y. L., Follett, R. F., Wilhelm, S., Koski, A. J., & Shahba, M. A. (2004). Carbon isotope discrimination of three Kentucky bluegrass cultivars with contrasting salinity tolerance. Agronomy Journal, 96, 571–575.
Sinex, S. (2007). Total dissolved solids (TDS) vs conductivity (spreadsheet). (http://academic.pgcc.edu/~ssinex/excelets/TDS_comparison.xls). Accessed 24 Mar 2014.
Trahan, N. A., Peterson, C. M. (2007). Factors impacting the health of roadside vegetation. Colorado Department of Transportation. Report No CDOT-DTD-R-2005-12. Denver, CO.
Wang, S., & Zhang, Q. (2010). Responses of creeping bentgrass to salt stress during in vitro germination. HortScience, 45, 1747–1750.
Wang, S., Zhang, Q., & Watkins, E. (2011). Evaluation of salinity tolerance of prairie junegrass, a potential low-maintenance turfgrass species. HortScience, 46, 1038–1043.
White, P. J., & Broadley, M. R. (2001). Chloride in soils and its uptake and movement within the plant: a review. Annals of Botany, 88, 967–988.
Zhang, Q., Rue, K., & Wang, S. (2012). Salinity effect on seed germination and growth of two warm-season native grass species. HortScience, 47, 527–530.
Acknowledgments
This study was funded by the Colorado Department of Transportation and the Colorado Agricultural Experiment Station. We thank R.D. Koski and E. Waltermire and the Colorado State Seed Laboratory for technical assistance; Janet Hardin, Patrick Byrne, and Anthony Koski for the review of previous drafts; and J. ZumBrunnen from the Colorado State University Greybill Statistical Laboratory for assistance with statistical analyses.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Electronic supplementary material
Below is the link to the electronic supplementary material.
Table 1
(PDF 49.5 KB)
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Dudley, M.M., Jacobi, W.R. & Brown, C.S. Roadway Deicer Effects on the Germination of Native Grasses and Forbs. Water Air Soil Pollut 225, 1984 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11270-014-1984-z
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11270-014-1984-z