Soil habitats of a coastal Antarctic environment: Primavera Station, Danco Coast, Antarctic Peninsula

BÖLTER, MANFRED; MATALONI, GABRIELA; MÖLLER, ROLF; SCHELTZ , ANNETTE

Tokyo, Japón

Simposio; XXXI Symposium on Polar Biology; 2008

NIPR- National Institute for Polar Research

During austral summer 2006, a spatial and temporal study on different mineral and organic soil environments was carried out in the area of the Argentine Primavera Station, located at Danco Coast, Antarctic Peninsula. Four sites were sampled for four times between beginning of January and mid of February. The analyses were on inorganic and organic matter, microbial communities and soil respiration. The data set showed a clear separation of the two main localities, only some seasonal influence could be detected during this study. The results indicate a microbial community in the mineral soils working at a “base line level” and showing only little variability in microbiological properties. However, samples from organic soils show great differentiation and much variation in microbial properties could be seen which further acts at much higher level than those of mineral soils. It is concluded from these data that this strong variation is a special feature of Antarctic soils, where different environments are located close to each other but have great differences in their actual and potential nutrient pools and turnover. These data are compared with those from other Antarctic environments.