2022 Early Hearing Detection & Intervention Virtual Conference

March 13 - 15, 2022

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5/24/2018 | 11:00 AM - 11:15 AM | EFFECTS OF WARMING AND ELEVATED CO2 ON ORGANIC MATTER DECOMPOSITION IN A PEATLAND USING AN ECOSYSTEM-SCALE EXPERIMENT | 410 B

EFFECTS OF WARMING AND ELEVATED CO2 ON ORGANIC MATTER DECOMPOSITION IN A PEATLAND USING AN ECOSYSTEM-SCALE EXPERIMENT

Globally, peatlands store a disproportionately large amount of carbon in peat relative to their surface area. Peat accumulates when primary production exceeds decomposition, therefore, it is important to understand how climate change may affect both production and decomposition rates in these saturated, carbon-rich environments. The Spruce and Peatland Responses Under Changing Environments (SPRUCE) experiment uses ten 12-m diameter enclosures to elevate air and peat temperatures (+0, +2.25, +4.5, +6.75, +9C) at ambient and elevated CO2 (eCO2) (+500 ppm) for 10 years in a northern Minnesota peatland. We measured decomposition rates of 6 litter types that vary in quality (spruce needles and fine roots, Labrador tea leaves and fine roots, and two Sphagnum species) for one year in the SPRUCE enclosures. There was little effect of temperature and eCO2 on aboveground litter decomposition; however, decomposition rates of fine roots increased with warming. A standardized cotton-strip assay deployed vertically into the peat found that tensile loss increased with temperature at all depths. Together, these results suggest that litter recalcitrance may be a stronger driver of aboveground litter decomposition than temperature in the first year of the SPRUCE experiment.

Organic Matter
Climate Change
Wetland

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Presenters/Authors

Natalie A. Griffiths (), Oak Ridge National Laboratory, griffithsna@ornl.gov;