CALM SITE U32A |
SAGWON HILLS MAT |
Site code |
U32B |
Site name |
Sagwon Hills MAT |
CAPS I Metadata form |
NA |
CAPS II Metadata form |
NA |
Responsible for data submission |
Nikolay
Shiklomanov |
Email Address |
shiklom@gwu.edu |
Institution/Organization |
GWU |
Location description |
Arctic Alaska |
Location Lat. |
69 deg.
24.06 min. N |
Location Lon. |
148 deg.
40.22 min. W |
Elevation avg. (m) |
360 |
Methods Grid |
100 |
Methods Other |
Air temperature, Soil surface temperature |
Landscape Description |
Foothills.
Flat hill crest, featureless |
Vegetation /Classification |
moist
acidic tundra |
Soils (or Material) |
Pergelic
Cryaquepts (79%), Histic Pergelic Cryaquepts (21%). |
Thaw depth measurements (year started)
|
1995 |
Air temp. measurements (year started) |
1995 |
Snow cover measurements (year started) |
NA |
soil temp. measurements (year started) |
1995 (soil surface only) |
soil moisture measurements (year started) |
NA |
general description of soil moisture (dry, moist, wet,
saturated) |
Moist |
soil texture: if non organic describe texture, if organic
indicate thickness of organic layer (cm) |
Organic
layer thickness: 15 + 0.9 cm.
Soil texture - silt |
DESCRIPTION OF AREA CONTAINING SITE:
Flat hill crest, featureless, moist
acidic tundra.
Vegetation communities: Moist
Eriophorum vaginatum, Betula nana, Salix pulchra, Hylocomium splendens
tussock-graminoid, dwarf- shrub tundra. Cover of top 5 species: Eriophorum
vaginatum (24%), Ledum decumbens (9%),Betula nana (9%), ylocomium splendens
(8%), Salix pulchra (6%)
Mean vegetation height: 5.9 +/- 6.4 cm.
Mean live moss layer thickness: 2.2
+/- 1.4 cm.
Organic layer thickness: 15 + 0.9
cm.
(Walker and Bockheim, 1995)
SOIL DESCRIPTION:
(predominant texture, i.e., ‘sand’, ‘gravel’,
‘peat’, etc.): Pergelic Cryaquepts (79%), Histic Pergelic
Cryaquepts (21%).
SAMPLING DESIGN AND METHOD:
Beginning in 1995, the active layer
has been probed at least annually at the site. The procedure involves pushing a
metal rod, calibrated in cm, to the point of refusal, interpreted in most cases
to be the frost table. Thaw depth measurements at each site were obtained by
probing at 5 m intervals along the plot’s two perpendicular and one
diagonal transect, resulting in 71 points per plot per probing date.
In 1995
the site was instrumented with several OnsetTM portable data loggers connected
to probe-type thermistors. Each logger/thermistor system has an effective
temperature range of -50oC to +33oC and resolution of
approximately 0.32oC. At the site, one thermistor was placed in a
radiation shield approximately 2 m above the ground surface, and nine loggers
were placed at the interface between mineral soil and organic material in
various microtopographic positions within the site. Temperature measurements
were collected at, 1 hr, and 2 hr intervals depending on season, and year. Details on methodology are provided in
Klene et. al 2001.
The
soil climate station (Sagwon2) was established in June of 1996 and is located
1.5 miles west of the Haul road (Dalton Hwy.) in the Sagwon hills within CALM
U32B site. The elevation is about 329 m (1080 ft). This station monitors air
temperature, soil temperature at various depths to a maximum of 120 cm, and
soil water contents at 10, 25, and 40 cm depths. Measurements are made at
20-minute intervals and averaged and recorded every hour.
REFERENCES:
Walker, D. A., and J. G. Bockheim,
Site selection for the portable flux towers, ARCSS/LAII/Flux Study, 13–16
June 1995, Summary of field activities, Land-Atmos.-Ice Interact. Sci. Manage.
Off., Geophys. Inst.,Univ. of Alaska-Fairbanks, 1995.
Shiklomanov, N.I. and F.E. Nelson. 2003 Climatic
variability in the Kuparuk region, north-central Alaska: optimizating spatial
and temporal interpolation in a sparse observation
network. Arctic, 56: 136-146.
Shiklomanov, N.I. and F.E.
Nelson. 2003 Statistical
representation of landscape-specific active-layer variability. In Phillips, M., Springman, S. M., and Arenson, L.
U. (eds.), Proceedings of the Eighth International Conference on Permafrost,
vol. 2. Lisse: A.A. Balkema, 1039-1044.
Walker
D.A., Jia G.J., Epstein H.E., Raynolds M.K., Chapin III F.S., Copass C.,
Hinzman L.D., Kane D., Knudson J.A., Maier H., Michaelson G.J., Nelson F.E.,
Ping C.L., Shiklomanov N.I.,
Romanovsky V.E., Shur Y. 2003
Vegetation-soil-thaw-depth relationships along a Low Arctic bioclimatic
gradient, Alaska: Synthesis of information from the Atlas studies. Permafrost and
Periglacial Processes, 14:
103-123.
Shiklomanov N. I. and F.
E. Nelson, F. E., 2002. Active-layer mapping at regional scales: a 13-year
spatial time series for the Kuparuk region, north-central Alaska. Permafrost and Periglacial Processes,
13: 219-230.
Klene
A.E., Nelson F.E., and N.I. Shiklomanov. 2001 The n-factor as a tool in
geocryological mapping: seasonal thaw in the Kuparuk River Basin, Alaska. Physical
Geography, 22(6): 449-466.
Klene
A.E., Nelson F.E., Shiklomanov N.I., and K.M. Hinkel. 2001 The n-factor in natural
landscapes: Variability of air and soil-surface temperatures, Kuparuk River
basin, Alaska. Arctic, Antarctic and Alpine Research, 33(2): 140-148.
Nelson,
F.E., Shiklomanov, N.I., and G.R. Mueller. Variability of active-layer
thickness at multiple spatial scales, north-central Alaska, USA. 1999 Arctic, Antarctic, and Alpine Research, 31(2): 179-186.
Shiklomanov,
N.I. and F.E. Nelson. Analytic representation of the active layer thickness
field, Kuparuk River basin, Alaska. 1999 Ecological
Modelling, 123: 105-125.
Bockheim,
J.G., Walker, D.A., Everett, L.R., Nelson, F.E. and N.I. Shiklomanov. 1998
. Soils and cryoturbation in moist
nonacidic and acidic tundra in the Kuparuk River basin, Arctic Alaska, USA. Arctic and Alpine Research, 30(2):
166-174.
Nelson,
F.E., Hinkel, K.M., Shiklomanov, N.I., Mueller, G.R., Miller, L.L., and D.A.
Walker.
Active-layer thickness in north central Alaska: systematic sampling, scale, and
spatial autocorrelation. 1998
Journal of Geophysical
Research-Atmospheres, 103(D22): 28963-28973.
Nelson,
F.E., Outcalt, S.I., Brown, J., Shiklomanov, N.I., and K.M. Hinkel. Spatial and
temporal attributes of the active-layer thickness record, Barrow, Alaska, USA,
1998 Proceedings of the Seventh International Conference on Permafrost.
Centre de etudes.
Soil temperature and soil moisture metadata and data are
also available at http://soils.usda.gov/survey/scan/alaska/Sagwon2/