Mass balance implies Holocene development of a low-relief karst patterned landscape

Chamberlin, Catherine A.; Bianchi, Thomas S.; Brown, Amy L.; Cohen, Matthew J.; Dong, Xiaoli; Flint, Madison K.; Martin, Jonathan B.; McLaughlin, Daniel L.; Murray, A. Brad; Pain, Andrea; Quintero, Carlos J.; Ward, Nicholas D.; Zhang, Xiaowen; Heffernan, James B.

doi:10.1016/J.CHEMGEO.2018.05.029

Title: Mass balance implies Holocene development of a low-relief karst patterned landscape

Journal Article · 23 May 2018 · Chemical Geology

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/J.CHEMGEO.2018.05.029 · OSTI ID:1457744

Chamberlin, Catherine A. ^[1]; Bianchi, Thomas S. ^[2];

^[2]; Cohen, Matthew J. ^[3]; Dong, Xiaoli ^[1]; Flint, Madison K. ^[2];

^[2]; McLaughlin, Daniel L. ^[4]; Murray, A. Brad ^[1]; Pain, Andrea ^[2]; Quintero, Carlos J. ^[5]; Ward, Nicholas D. ^[6]; Zhang, Xiaowen ^[2]; Heffernan, James B. ^[1]

Duke Univ., Durham, NC (United States). Nicholas School of the Environment
Univ. of Florida, Gainesville, FL (United States). Dept. of Geological Sciences
Univ. of Florida, Gainesville, FL (United States). School of Forest Resources and Conservation
Virginia Polytechnic Inst. and State Univ. (Virginia Tech), Blacksburg, VA (United States). Dept. of Forest Resources and Environmental Conservation
Univ. of Florida, Gainesville, FL (United States). Dept. of Soil and Water Sciences
Univ. of Florida, Gainesville, FL (United States). Dept. of Geological Sciences; Pacific Northwest National Lab. (PNNL), Sequim, WA (United States). Marine Sciences Lab.

We constructed mass balances of both calcium and phosphorus for two watersheds in Big Cypress National Preserve in southwest Florida (USA) to evaluate the time scales over which its striking landscape pattern developed. This low-relief carbonate landscape is dotted with evenly spaced, evenly sized, shallow surface depressions that annually fill with surface water and thus support wetland ecosystems (e.g. cypress domes) embedded in a pine-dominated upland matrix with exposed bedrock. Local and landscape scale feedbacks between hydrology, ecological dynamics and limestone dissolution are hypothesized to explain this karst dissolution patterning. This hypothesis requires the region to be wet enough to initiate surface water storage, which constrains landscape formation to interglacial periods. The time scale therefore would be relatively recent if creation of the observed pattern occurred in the current interglacial period (i.e. Holocene), and older time scales could reflect inherited patterns from previous inter-glacial periods, or from other processes of abiotic karstification. We then determined phosphorus stocks across four landscape compartments and estimated the limestone void space (i.e., wetland depression volume) across the landscape to represent cumulative calcium export. We calculated fluxes in (e.g., atmospheric deposition) and out (i.e., solute export) of the landscape to determine landscape denudation rates through mass balance. Comparing stocks and annual fluxes yielded independent estimates of landscape age from the calcium and phosphorus budgets. Our mass balance results indicate that the landscape began to develop in the early-mid Holocene (12,000–5000 ybp). Radiocarbon dating estimates implied similar rates of dissolution (~1 m per 3000–3500 years), and were in agreement with Holocene origin. This supports the hypothesis that ecohydrologic feedbacks between hydrology and vegetation occurring during the present interglacial period are sufficient to shape this landscape into the patterns we see today, and more broadly suggests the potential importance of biota in the development of macro-scale karst features.

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Research Organization:: Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), Richland, WA (United States)

Sponsoring Organization:: USDOE; National Science Foundation (NSF)

Grant/Contract Number:: DEB#1354783; AC05-76RL01830

OSTI ID:: 1457744

Alternate ID(s):: OSTI ID: 1578159

Report Number(s):: PNNL-SA-128697; PII: S0009254118302729

Journal Information:: Chemical Geology, Vol. 527, Issue C; ISSN 0009-2541

Publisher:: ElsevierCopyright Statement

Country of Publication:: United States

Language:: English

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Cited by: 15 works

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Related Subjects

58 GEOSCIENCES
54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES
Biokarst
Mass balance
Chemical denudation
Self-organization
Calcium
Phosphorus
Weathering
aquatic
karst
wetland
wetland inundation
wetland model
wetland soils
calcium
potassium
carbon
radiocarbon
holocene
geology
hydrogeology
hydrogeomorphic
pattern
patterned landscape
biogeochemistry
carbon cycling
ecosystem
erosion
export
global change
interface
marsh
terrestial aquatic interface
terrestrial
inorganic