588

Site number:

588

Authors:

IBC, GGGC, MRB

Date recorded:

1990/01/30

Reason Sampled:

Leaching experiment using lithium chloride tracer to determine rate of leaching; control plot examination

Description:

Approximately 350m northwest of the western end of Scott Base in the floor of a shallow gully, 20m NW of site 587 and 3-4m lower in altitude; about 50m north of the Scott Base to McMurdo Station; at this site, 4 contiguous 1m X 1m plots were set out and 3 irrigated with LiCl, the 4th (northernmost) with H2O; this sampling was from the control plot

Altitude:

55 m

Aspect:

E

Slope:

3 °

Climate

Soil climate zone:

Coastal Antarctic

Estimated mean annual temperature:

-18 °C

Frozen ground depth:

25 cm

Frozen type:

Hard ice-cemented

Frozen comment:

25cm

Geology

Geological setting:

Rocks are predominantly scoria flows of the McMurdo Volcanics; Last Glaciation Ross 1 ice covered the site and traces of rocks (sandstone and granite granules and small pebbles) probably from the Royal Society Range can be found; the drift mantle is thin and patchy with bedrock a little below the surface

Patterned ground:

Weakly developed frost heave polygons

Surface weathering or surface features:

Soil

Soil parent material:

Bouldery till and slope debris predominantly from scoria with minor accessions of sedimentary and granitic rocks

Previous disturbance:

Nil

Soil weathering stage:

1 (Campbell & Claridge 1975)

Soil moisture status:

Oceanic subxerous; a 'wet' site in a gully below a snow patch which thaws in some years

Biological activity:

Nil