The pH of Australian soils: field results from a national survey
Patrice de Caritat A B , Michelle Cooper A and John Wilford A
+ Author Affiliations
- Author Affiliations
A Geoscience Australia, GPO Box 378, Canberra, ACT 2601, Australia.
B Corresponding author. Email: patrice.decaritat@ga.gov.au
Soil Research 49(2) 173-182 https://doi.org/10.1071/SR10121
Submitted: 10 June 2010 Accepted: 1 September 2010 Published: 10 March 2011
Journal Compilation © CSIRO Publishing 2011 Open Access CC BY-NC-ND
Abstract
The pH is one of the fundamental soil properties governing nutrient availability, metal mobility, elemental toxicity, microbial activity, and plant growth. The field pH of topsoil (0–0.10 m depth) and subsoil (~0.60–0.80 m depth) was measured on floodplain soils collected near the outlet of 1186 catchments covering >6 Mkm2 (6 × 1012 m2) or ~80% of Australia. Field pH duplicate data, obtained at 124 randomly selected sites, indicate a precision of 0.5 pH unit (or 7%), and mapped pH patterns are consistent and meaningful. The median topsoil pH is 6.5, while the subsoil pH has a median of 7 but is strongly bimodal (6–6.5 and 8–8.5). In most cases (64%) the topsoil and subsoil pH values are similar; among the sites exhibiting a pH contrast, those with more acidic topsoils are more common (28%) than those with more alkaline topsoils (7%). The distribution of soil pH at the national scale indicates the strong controls exerted by precipitation and ensuing leaching (e.g. low pH along the coastal fringe, high pH in the dry centre), aridity (e.g. high pH where calcrete is common in the regolith), vegetation (e.g. low pH reflecting abundant soil organic matter), and subsurface lithology (e.g. high pH over limestone bedrock). The new data, together with existing soil pH datasets, can support regional-scale decision-making relating to agricultural, environmental, infrastructural, and mineral exploration decisions.
Additional keywords: acidity, alkalinity, baseline, regolith, soil quality.
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