Eastern Canadian boreal forest soil and foliar chemistry show evidence of resilience to long-term nitrogen addition

Abstract

The boreal forest is one of the world's largest terrestrial biome and plays crucial roles in global biogeochemical cycles, such as carbon (C) sequestration in vegetation and soil. However, the impacts of decades of N deposition on N-limited ecosystems, like the eastern Canadian boreal forest, remain unclear. For 13 years, N deposition was simulated by periodically adding ammonium nitrate on soils of two boreal coniferous forests (i.e., balsam fir and black spruce) of eastern Canada, at low (LN) and high (HN) rates, corresponding to 3 and 10 times the ambient N deposition, respectively. We show that more than a decade of N addition had no strong effects on mineral soil C, N, P, and cation concentrations and on foliar total Ca, K, Mg, and Mn concentrations. In organic soil, C stock was not affected by N addition while N stock increased, and exchangeable Ca²⁺ and Mg²⁺ decreased at the balsam fir site under HN treatment. At both sites, LN treatment had nearly no impact on foliage and soil chemistry but foliar N and N:P significantly increased under HN treatment, potentially leading to foliar nutrient imbalance. Overall, our work indicates that, in the eastern Canadian boreal forest, soil and foliar nutrient concentrations and stocks are resilient to increasing N deposition potentially because, in the context of N limitation, extra N would be rapidly immobilized by soil micro-organisms and vegetation. These findings could improve modeling future boreal forest soil C stocks and biomass growth and could help in planning forest management strategies in eastern Canada.