The effect of copper applications on the movement of copper and other elements in organic soils

Copper concentrations should be maintained at 100 ppm (gg Cu g^?1 dry soil) in the surface layers of undecomposed peat soils, and 400 ppm in humified muck soils. The Cu supports plant nutrition, and inhibits enzymes that degrade the organic soils (Histosols). The required or extravagant applications of Cu may threaten groundwater quality if the Cu, or elements displaced by the Cu, moves downwards in the soils. To test this, powdered CUSO₄.5H₂O was applied to the top 15 cm of replicated microplots of organic soils to increase their Cu concentrations by 0, 150, 500, and 1500 ppm at field sites A (peat) and B (muck) in May 1978 and by 0, 100, 300, and 800 ppm at field site C (mucky peat) in 1979. Duplicate cores of up to 50 cm depth were taken in the spring of 1981 from each of the 56 microplots and analyzed. At all sites, none of the Cu additions caused significant displacement and downward movement of Ca, Mg, K, Fe, Mn, or Zn. There was a leaching of small fractions of the applied Cu down to 40 cm depth only when 1500 ppm of Cu was added to the humus-poor, acidic peat at site A. Some of the Cu applied at the 500 ppm rate at site A and 1500 ppm rate at site B was found in the 20 to 30 cm zone. At site C, none of the applied Cu moved from the top 20 cm (plow layer).