Effect of Permafrost and Palaeo-Environmental History on Soil Formation in the lower Kolyma Lowland, Siberia

Danish Journal of Geography 96: 40–50, 1996. The Geography of soils has been studied in the tundra of the sandy Kolyma Lowland between latitudes 69 ° and 70 ° N. Generally, soils show characteristics indicative of variable intensity of previous fossil Podzol formation in the present day cryoturbated active layer. Hence, the transformation, transfer and segregation of chemical substances in the soil profile can be interpreted as evidence of palaeo-climate changes. Fossil soil features indicate horizon differentiating processes active in a former warmer and wetter climate. The chemical composition reflects a general sequence of pedogenetic translocation processes. Early stages of soil formation primarily involved translocation of weathering products from a carbonic acid weathering system. Inorganic Al-Fe silicate and phosphate materials were translocated into B horizons as the A horizon became more acid. At a later stage the increasing activity of simple organic acids in the A horizons caused a migration of metal-oreanic complexes and the formation of thin Podzols. These, mostly fossil features, are today characterized by secondary base accumulation, cryoturbation and geochemical processes above a shallow permafrost table. The permafrost table probably acts as a geochemical barrier controlling a system of processes reflecting changes in, e.g. soil water tension and redox conditions

Arctic · Bog · Earth science · Geochemistry · Geography · Horizon · Humus · Peat · Pedogenesis · Permafrost · Physical geography · Podzol · Soil horizon · Soil water · Taiga · Tundra · Weathering · Clay minerals and soil interactions · Climate change and permafrost · Ecology · Geology · Oceanography · Soil and Unsaturated Flow · Soil Science

• Preliminary Studies of Soils in North-East Greenland between 74° and 75° Northern Latitude

  Bjarne Holm Jakobsen•Geografisk Tidsskrift-Danish…•1992

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