Base cation availability and leaching after nitrogen fertilisation of a eucalypt plantation
A. D. Mitchell A C and P. J. Smethurst A B DA CRC Forestry Ltd, Private Bag 12, Hobart, Tas. 7001, Australia.
B CSIRO Forest Biosciences, Private Bag 12, Hobart, Tas. 7001, Australia.
C Current address: NZ Sport Turf Institute (Inc), PO Box 347, Palmerston North, New Zealand.
D Corresponding author. Email: Philip.Smethurst@csiro.au
Australian Journal of Soil Research 46(5) 445-454 https://doi.org/10.1071/SR08005
Submitted: 7 January 2008 Accepted: 23 June 2008 Published: 5 August 2008
Abstract
Increasing use of nitrogen fertiliser in eucalypt plantations is affecting base cation availability via changes in concentrations in soil solution and leaching. While low base cation availability will probably limit future productivity of some eucalypt plantations, the extent and temporal patterns of availability as affected by N fertilisation were unknown. After applying urea in a fertiliser experiment in a 9-year-old Eucalyptus nitens plantation, soil solution chemistry was monitored for 13 months and maximum potential leaching estimated. The cumulative effects of earlier ammonium sulfate, urea, and superphosphate fertiliser applications had enhanced tree growth, base cation uptake, and probably leaching, but led to decreased pH and concentrations of exchangeable pools of Mg and K in surface soil (0–0.1 m). In soil solution before re-fertilisation, in the high N treatment, concentrations of K in soil solution were significantly lower, and of Ca significantly higher than the treatment that received no fertiliser. On many occasions during the 13-month period after this re-fertilisation event, increased concentrations of NH4, NO3, Ca, Mg, and K in soil solution were significant (0–0.6 m depth), and were consistently highest in the high fertiliser treatment at 0.3–0.6 m depth. We conclude that N fertilisation increased base cation availability during the study and probably for several subsequent years, but there was a risk that significant pools of N and base cations were leached off-site. Future research and modelling of base cation availability in plantations should consider these changes induced by N-fertiliser that increase availability for several years but lead to longer term decreases in availability.
Additional keywords: base cations, nitrogen fertiliser, nutrient leaching, Eucalyptus nitens, soil solution.
Acknowledgments
We thank Norske-Skog Ltd for access to the experimental sites, and Craig Baillie for assistance with sample collection. We thank Ann Wilkinson for assistance with the analysis of soil solutions, Michael Battaglia for assistance with tree growth and water balance modelling, and Peter Clinton, Richard Doyle, and an anonymous reviewer for comments on an earlier version of the manuscript.
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