This summer Nick Stanich, Josh Beniston and Melissa Herman, ENR graduate students in the Soil Science specialization area, traveled to Iceland as part of a team of soil scientists to describe soil development along the recessional path of the rapidly receding glacier Skaftafellsjökull. The research was part of an exchange program developed between The Ohio State University and the University of Iceland. Our three graduate students studied in Iceland for the summer quarter, and University of Iceland graduate student, Olga Vilmundardottir, is currently here at Ohio State for three quarters of study.
In Nick's words, the trip was exhilarating...
| The experience was roughly broken down into two components: a hands-on educational component that counted towards curricular credit, and a research component. As part of the curriculum-based experience, Iceland's Soil Conservation Service kindly hosted us for ten days, guiding us through the Soil Conservation Service's efforts to restore degraded land in Iceland, and to prevent catastrophic flooding from the ash-choked streams that have resulted from Eyjafjallajökull's recent eruption in March. |
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To further our hands on experience, Professors Gudrun Gisladottir, Thora Ellen Thorhallsdottir, and Gísli Már Gíslason, from the University of Iceland, led us on a six day backpacking trip to Thjorsarver, a remote wetland at the base of the Hofsjökull Icecap in the central Icelandic highlands. Thjorsarver was an experience like none other, over the course of the six days we traversed glaciers, mountainous skree slopes, hiked barefoot through mossy wetlands, forded 30+ near freezing glacial rivers, and bathed in natural hot-springs, all while receiving lessons from three experts on the ecology and geo-morphology of Iceland.
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| Curricular-based experiences aside, we traveled to our research site at Skaftafellsjökull, an outlet glacier of Vatnajökull located in south central Iceland. |
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Our research entails studying how soil develops along the recessional path of of Skaftafellsjökull, which has been rapidly receding since 1890. The pro-glacial area is approximately 7.5km2 and the location of the glacial front has been identified for the years 1890, 1945, and 2002. Six transects running parallel to the glacial face have been identified for each of the three years, and three samples were taken from each transect. The sampling was surprisingly difficult. Unlike the older, well developed till soils of Ohio that are largely devoid of coarse rocky fragments, the till-based Andisols in Iceland are extremely rocky and impossible to sample with a soil core. We initially attempted to use a water displacement method to measure the bulk density, but our volume calculations displayed too much error, so we adopted the polyurethane foam displacement method instead.
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After three intense weeks of sampling and field sieving gravely soils to 8mm, we had accomplished our objective of sampling two depths and describing vegetative cover at each of the 54 plots, and were ready to return to the University of Iceland's campus in Reykjavik. In Reykjavik we sieved the soil down to the <2mm fraction, which was extremely time intensive due to the large number of roots and moss fragments, and we measured the volume of the foam casts to determine bulk density.
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Back at Ohio State, biological, chemical, and physical properties such as microbial biomass, nutrient levels, carbon content, texture, moisture retention and particle density will be measured and the data will be used to identify trends that quantify short term soil development in Iceland as glaciers retreat into the century.
Our experience in Iceland was delightful, and logistically flawless. Special thanks to Ann Bau, Gudrun Gisladottir and Sveinn Runólfsson for planning the majority of the experience and for going out of their way to ensure that we had a nice bed and were well fed.
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