FOR 535 Advanced Forest Soils - 3 Credit Hours
Spring 2015
Tu, Th 8:00 – 9:20 am 319 Marshall Hall
Instructor: Russell Briggs, Office: 358 Illick Hall, Phone: 470-6989;
Email: rdbriggs@esf.edu
Course description:
Three hours of lecture and discussion (based on published literature) will focus on
fundamental soil processes that influence forest ecosystem function with emphasis on
forest productivity.
All Day Field Trip: Thursday April 23,
Two sites: Saratoga Forest Tree Nursery, Aztech Technologies Remediation Wetland
Required Reading
Books can be expensive and we will use only selected portions, so I am not requiring
you to purchase them (one copy of each text will be available on reserve in Moon):
Berg, B., and R. Laskowski. 2006. Litter decomposition: A guide to carbon and nutrient
turnover, Volume 38. Advances in Ecological Research. Elsevier Academic Press
ISBN-13 978-0-12-013938-5. 428 p.
Fisher, R.F., and D. Binkley. 2000. Ecology and management of forest soils. Third
edition. John Wiley and Sons, Inc. 489 pp.
All other readings will be assigned from the published literature, available via Moon
library.
Final Assessment
________________________________________________________
Component
(%)
3 Exams@20% each
60
Exam 1: take-home (decomposition dynamics)
Exam 2: in-class
Exam 3: in-class
Literature Summaries
20
Participation (class attendance, and paper discussion)
10
Field Trip Participation
10
1. Introduction
 Historical perspectives and evolution of forest soils research during last 50 years
o http://soilslab.cfr.washington.edu/S-7/HistForSoilNA.html
 Forest soils and vegetation development (F&B Chapt. 2);
 Soils of the major forest biomes (F&B Chapt. 3)
2. Forest Floor
 Classification
 Soil Organisms
 Dynamics of forest litter disappearance
3. Soil organic matter (SOM) and soil organic carbon (SOC)
 SOM and SOC Classification
 cycling & distribution - canopy to soil solution
o GPP, NPP and respiration
o synthesis vs. maintenance
 DOC (SOM, WSOM)
o fractionation (solubility, MW, chromatography) and cycling
4. Managing ecosystem services on a tree scale
 Mycorrhizae
 Element distribution and annual requirements
 Seasonal mobility of nutrients within trees
 Diagnostic techniques for detection of nutrient deficiencies
 Carbon allocation and productivity
 Influence of soil physical properties
5. Sugar Maple Decline and Forest Health – the continuing saga
6. Managing ecosystem services on a local scale - water and nutrition
 fertilization
 harvesting
 site preparation
 moisture - nutrition interactions
7. Site Classification
8. Managing ecosystem services on a regional scale



disturbances
global change
environmental quality