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Sagwon Hills MAT

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General Information

Created: 2014-01-02 11:14:40
Modified: 2014-02-03 11:37:58

Active: No
Country:United States
Site:Sagwon
CALM-Code:U32 B
Responsible Countries: United States,
Timezone:UTC/GMT -09:00 hours
Vegetation Type:Tundra
Responsible Person:Nikolay Shiklomanov
Type:Grid
Nodes:121
Rows:11
Columns:11
Offset:10 m

 

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)

 

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.

Soil temperature and soil moisture metadata and data are also available at http://soils.usda.gov/survey/scan/alaska/Sagwon2/

Slope:4 °
Aspect:108
Permafrost Zone:Continuous
Vegetation:Moist acidic tundra
Landform:Foothills. Flat hill crest, featureless
Lithology:Organic layer thickness: 15 + 0.9 cm. Soil texture - silt Pergelic Cryaquepts (79%), Histic Pergelic Cryaquepts (21%).
Description:General description of soil moisture: Moist
Access Timeseries
Bibliographic References
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.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/98jd00534
Walker, D. A., and J. G. Bockheim, Site selection for the portable flux towers, ARCSS/LAII/Flux Study, 1316 June 1995, Summary of field activities, Land-Atmos.-Ice Interact. Sci. Manage. Off., Geophys. Inst.,Univ. of Alaska-Fairbanks, 1995.
http://dx.doi.org/10.2172/290848
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.
http://dx.doi.org/10.14430/arctic609
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.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/b978-0-444-53643-3.00095-9
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.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/ppp.452
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.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/02723646.2001.10642754
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.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/15230430.2001.12003416
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.
http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/1552606
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.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/s0304-3800(99)00127-1
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.
http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/1552131
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.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/ppp.3430030405
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.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/ppp.425

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Sagwon MAT
Map

Longitude:-148.8056 °
Latitude:69.401 °
Elevation:325.444427 m
EPSG:4326
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