On the north side of Lake Vanda, opposite and north of the old Vanda Station site on a broad even sloping lake bench/fan surface about 200 m from the lake edge; two sites were established across the slope and about 20 m apart; the sites are adjacent 1 metre square plots onto which LiCl (3 plots) and H2O (1 plot) were irrigated; the 1995 sampling was from plot 1 and from soils up slope and down slope of the application site; soil 792 was from the eastern replicate series and from the application plot
Altitude:
200 m
Aspect:
S
Slope:
8 °
Location Data
Observer
IBC
GPS
No
Latitude Longitude DMS
77° 31.18' S 161° 40.80' E
Latitude Longitude DD
-77.51970 161.6800
Latitude longitude precision DD
0.00008 0.0008
Locality
Wright Valley, near Lake Vanda
Survey
not recorded
Climate
Soil climate zone:
Central Mountain
Estimated mean annual temperature:
-23
°C
Frozen ground depth:
0 ND
Frozen type:
dry frozen
Frozen comment:
ND
Geology
Geological setting:
The site lies within the zone of lake benches formed by former rises in the level of Lake Vanda and the deposits are probably lake sediments that have been resorted from fan gravels and older glacial till deposits; reworking of the sediments takes place primarily by gentle wave action during periods when there has been seasonal thawing of the lake margin; periodic low energy flows from nearby fans may have contributed some sediment
Patterned ground:
A broad weakly developed rectangular net pattern with shallow troughs predominantly sand filled
Surface weathering or surface features:
The surface has a weakly developed pebble pavement with occasional cobble clasts; there is little surface staining; larger clasts show some abrasion and moderate ventifaction
Soil
Soil parent material:
Fine gravelly sand from fan sediments with lake edge reworking
Previous disturbance:
Not previously disturbed apart from some occasional foot trafficking and disturbance associated with establishing the experiment