ACRRE Research Notes

2015-12-01

Chang, S.

During reclamation of oil sands mines, overburden or tailings sand substrates are often capped with a peat mineral mix. These soils can exhibit a number of challenging properties, including low availability of water and nutrients such as nitrogen. Some trees planted on oil sands mines have...

2015-03-04

Purdy, B., Macdonald, E.

Soils from oil sands mining can be affected by salts leached from tailings or overburden materials – resulting in saline soil conditions. As a result, re-establishment of forests on saline sites is an important goal on reclaimed oil sands mines. Forest vegetation is typically thought to be...

2015-12-01

Naeth, M.A., Chang, S.

Microbial communities are important indicators of soil quality and ecosystem productivity in both natural and reclaimed ecosystems. The presence of diverse microbial communities promotes decomposition of organic materials and, in turn, the cycling of nutrients. Coarse woody debris is a...

2015-12-01

Landhäusser, S., Macdonald, E.

The forest understory serves as a key source of plant diversity and plays an important role in various forest processes. However, re-establishment of the forest understory community has proven challenging when using conventional reclamation techniques because of limited availability of native...

2015-04-03

Naeth, A.M., Desserud, P.

Pipeline construction can disturb land through vegetation removal, soil mixing and compaction, and destruction of biological crusts (microorganisms, lichen, moss). Most efforts to restore native rough fescue after pipeline construction through soil replacement and/or rough fescue seeding have...

2015-09-01

Lieffers, V., Van Rensen, C., Vinge, T., Nielsen, S.

Restoration of legacy seismic lines has become a topic of frequent conversation among land managers. The release of the federal recovery strategy for woodland caribou in 2012 has contributed to this momentum with companies now investing considerable resources in restoring legacy seismic lines....

2015-09-01

Lieffers, V., Landhäusser, S.

In situ extraction of oil sands reserves requires the production of many temporary exploration drilling pads to assess the bitumen layer. In these operations the forest floor and topsoil can be stripped off, stockpiled and replaced after drilling. As a result, many of these pads are slow to...

2015-03-04

Zwiazek, J.

Reclamation projects underway in northern Alberta aim to convert tailings ponds—a byproduct of oil sands production that typically have high pH and salinity—into constructed wetlands. Though research suggests that these wetlands can support healthy aquatic plant communities, we know little about...

2015-03-04

Chang, S.

Oil sands mining removes large areas of vegetation and soil across the landscape, thus post-mining reclamation requires the development of reconstructed soils to support tree growth. These reconstructed soils are generally made up of a top layer of peat mineral soil mix, and an underlying layer...

2015-12-01

Landhäusser, S., Lieffers, V.

When clearing mine sites for development, forest floor material is salvaged and often directly placed onto nearby reclamation sites. Soils salvaged from aspen forests have significant quantities of root fragments contained in these materials. Aspen roots are known to produce aspen suckers...