Wood ash application increases pH but does not harm the soil mesofauna

TY - JOUR

T1 - Wood ash application increases pH but does not harm the soil mesofauna

AU - Qin, Jiayi

AU - Hovmand, Mads Frederik

AU - Ekelund, Flemming

AU - Rønn, Regin

AU - Christensen, Søren

AU - Groot, Gerard Arjen de

AU - Mortensen, Louise Hindborg

AU - Skov, Simon

AU - Krogh, Paul Henning

PY - 2017

Y1 - 2017

N2 - Application of bioash from biofuel combustion to soil supports nutrient recycling, but may have unwanted and detrimental ecotoxicological side-effects, as the ash is a complex mixture of compounds that could affect soil invertebrates directly or through changes in their food or habitat conditions. To examine this, we performed laboratory toxicity studies of the effects of wood-ash added to an agricultural soil and the organic horizon of a coniferous plantation soil with the detrivore soil collembolans Folsomia candida and Onychiurus yodai, the gamasid predaceous mite Hypoaspis aculeifer, and the enchytraeid worm Enchytraeus crypticus. We used ash concentrations spanning 0-75 g kg-1 soil. As ash increases pH we compared bioash effects with effects of calcium hydroxide, Ca(OH)2, the main liming component of ash. Only high ash concentrations above 15 g kg-1 agricultural soil or 17 t ha-1 had significant effects on the collembolans. The wood ash neither affected H. aculeifer nor E. crypticus. The estimated osmolalities of Ca(OH)2 and the wood ash were similar at the LC50 concentration level. We conclude that short-term chronic effects of wood ash differ among different soil types, and osmotic stress is the likely cause of effects while high pH and heavy metals is of minor importance.

AB - Application of bioash from biofuel combustion to soil supports nutrient recycling, but may have unwanted and detrimental ecotoxicological side-effects, as the ash is a complex mixture of compounds that could affect soil invertebrates directly or through changes in their food or habitat conditions. To examine this, we performed laboratory toxicity studies of the effects of wood-ash added to an agricultural soil and the organic horizon of a coniferous plantation soil with the detrivore soil collembolans Folsomia candida and Onychiurus yodai, the gamasid predaceous mite Hypoaspis aculeifer, and the enchytraeid worm Enchytraeus crypticus. We used ash concentrations spanning 0-75 g kg-1 soil. As ash increases pH we compared bioash effects with effects of calcium hydroxide, Ca(OH)2, the main liming component of ash. Only high ash concentrations above 15 g kg-1 agricultural soil or 17 t ha-1 had significant effects on the collembolans. The wood ash neither affected H. aculeifer nor E. crypticus. The estimated osmolalities of Ca(OH)2 and the wood ash were similar at the LC50 concentration level. We conclude that short-term chronic effects of wood ash differ among different soil types, and osmotic stress is the likely cause of effects while high pH and heavy metals is of minor importance.

KW - Enchytraeus crypticus

KW - Folsomia candida

KW - Hypoaspis aculeifer

KW - Onychiurus yodai

KW - Osmolality

KW - Reproduction

KW - Soil pH

KW - Wood ash

U2 - 10.1016/j.envpol.2017.02.041

DO - 10.1016/j.envpol.2017.02.041

M3 - Journal article

C2 - 28245950

AN - SCOPUS:85013811636

SN - 0269-7491

VL - 224

SP - 581

EP - 589

JO - Environmental Pollution

JF - Environmental Pollution

ER -