Soil Analysis Of A Volunteer Wetland

1
Soil Analysis Of A Volunteer Wetland

• Danette Miller
• Advisors Dr. Nairn and Dr. Strevett
• University of Oklahoma

2
Overview

• Importance of substrate
• Field methods
• Laboratory methods
• Analysis
• Results
• Conclusions

3
Substrate

• Sink
• Long term
• retention of metals
  
• Types
• Organic
• Mineral

4
Problem Statement

• Is the substrate in the volunteer wetland a sink
  for soluble metals in the mine water discharge?

5
Study Site
6
Field Methods

• Sample collection
• Auger, slide hammer,
• manual extraction
• Replicates
• Sample storage

7
Laboratory Methods

• pH
• Moisture content
• Particle density
• Pore space
• Bulk density
• Total metals
• Microwave Digestion
• AA spectrophotometer

8
Results

• pH
• 6.08 to 7.56
• Moisture content
• Surface 55 to 86
• Subsurface 25 to 42
• Particle density
• Surface 0.26 to 0.56 g/cm3
• Subsurface 0.27 to 0.57 g/cm3

9
Results

• Bulk Density
• Surface 0.3 to 0.6 g/cm3
• Subsurface ND
• Total metals
• Stratified trends

10
Results Iron (Fe) Trends
11
Results Zinc (Zn) Trends
12
Conclusions

• Substrate is a sink
• Trends
• Surface iron concentrations are elevated
• Subsurface iron concentrations are similar to
  background levels
• Zinc trends were similar to iron trends

13
Future Research

• Additional metals
• Pb, Cd
• Available metals
• metal concentration available for
  biomass uptake

14
Acknowledgements

• NSF
• Dr. Nairn and Dr. Strevett
• REU lab research crew
• Carrie Evenson and Jane Sund
• Jacob Manko and Todd Wolfard
• Erin Breetzke and Lisa Hare
• Sharon and Janna Robbins
• Wetland Willy