6533b822fe1ef96bd127dd73

RESEARCH PRODUCT

La collection historique d’échantillons de sols de l’essai patrimonial des ‘42 parcelles’ (INRAE, Versailles) : une machine à remonter le temps...

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Following three previous papers (van Oort et al., 2016, 2017, 2020) dealing with current soil characteristics and geochemical budgets in surface horizons, as well as the impacts of fertilization in subsurface horizons in soils of INRAE’s long term bare fallow experiment (the 42-plots trial), we now present some chronological aspects of soil evolution at the soil’s surface since 1928. For that, we analyzed several series of about 15 samples from the historical sample archive for 10 representative treatments: fertilizers with acidifying effects (ammonium sulphate, ammonium phosphate), fertilizers with dispersive effects (sodium nitrate, sylvinite, and potassium chloride), superphosphate, amendments with alkaline effects (basic slag, calcium carbonate), horse manure, as well as two reference plots, without inputs. We examined temporal evolutions of: i) edaphic parameters such as organic carbon and clay contents, pH, CEC and exchangeable cations; ii) total concentrations of major and trace elements; iii) the mineralogical composition of clay and fine silt fractions with a focus on the acidifying ammonium treatments. This work produced original findings on the magnitudes of pedogeochemical changes that occurred during the 90 years of the experiment. Regarding previous results on soil-depth impacts, our findings contribute at recounting complementary parts of a same history of soil development. constraint by different fertilization practices. From a pedological point of view, the 42-plots experiment acts as a “pedotron” under real climatic conditions, showing an acceleration of soil processes of the silt Luvisol following different pedological pathways as a function of the applied fertilizer or amendment.