Carbon Accumulation in Freshwater Marsh Soils: a Synthesis for Temperate North America
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GENERAL WETLAND SCIENCE
Carbon Accumulation in Freshwater Marsh Soils: a Synthesis for Temperate North America Amanda L. Loder 1
&
Sarah A. Finkelstein 1
Received: 15 August 2019 / Accepted: 22 December 2019 # Society of Wetland Scientists 2020
Abstract Freshwater marshes are prevalent in North America, yet their soil carbon stocks remain poorly quantified. To better understand these stocks, and rates of carbon accumulation over short and long timescales, we synthesize available data on soil properties and rates of carbon accumulation in freshwater marshes in the temperate region of North America. Our findings suggest that freshwater marshes are not defined consistently, and that wetland classification schemes may undervalue presumed carbon stocks in freshwater marsh soils. Rates of carbon accumulation in freshwater marshes are often measured over recent time scales (last 50–100 years); these short-term rates are on average (± SD) 155 ± 74 g C m−2 yr−1 in temperate North America. Long-term rates of carbon accumulation (measured over centuries and millennia) are on average 51 ± 38 g C m−2 yr−1 yet infrequently measured. Our synthesis of rates of carbon accumulation and vertical accretion, bulk densities, and organic carbon contents suggests that freshwater marshes are accumulating carbon at comparable rates to salt marshes over short timescales and temperate peatlands over longer timescales. These timescales need to be clearly defined in order to improve estimates of the capacity for freshwater marshes to be net carbon sinks presently and in the future. Keywords Wetland . Carbon sequestration . Dating methods . Paleoecology . Holocene . Wetland restoration
Introduction There is a rapidly growing interest in the role of wetlands in the global carbon cycle, and recognition of their substantive carbon pool and potential to take up or release enough carbon to affect the global climate (Heimann and Reichstein 2008; Petrescu et al. 2015; Ausseil et al. 2015). Wetlands can store large amounts of carbon in waterlogged soils due to low rates of decomposition (Reddy and Delaune 2008; Mitsch and Gosselink 2015), but are simultaneously the largest natural source of methane (Saunois et al. 2019). Net carbon fluxes from wetlands (notably boreal peatlands) have influenced atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide and methane over Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (https://doi.org/10.1007/s13157-019-01264-6) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. * Amanda L. Loder [email protected] 1
Department of Geography & Planning, University of Toronto, 100 St. George Street, Toronto, ON M5S 3G3, Canada
past centuries and millennia, and will have an important influence on future climate change (Frolking and Roulet 2007; Yu 2011; Petrescu et al. 2015). There is increasing recognition and consideration of major carbon deposits in understudied wetland soils (e.g., Dargie et al. 2017; Byun et al. 2018). However, carbon stocks have yet to be estimated with r
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