2,4‐D Movement in Allophanic Soils from Two Contrasting Climatic Regions

Abstract

Allophanic top‐ and subsoils from the Mexican and Newzealand Central Volcanic Plateau, as well as a nonallophanic sandy loam soil, were sampled to study the impact of organic matter and allophane content on 2,4‐D fate. High sorption rates were found, especially in the two topsoils from Mexico and New Zealand, with distribution coefficient (K _d ) obtained from displacement experiments in packed columns equal to 7.61 and 8.43 L kg⁻¹ respectively. 2,4‐Dichlorophenoxyacetic acid transfer through the soil columns was found to be in chemical nonequilibrium and was well predicted using a two‐site sorption model. For the two allophanic top soils, K _d obtained from batch was very different to the K _d obtained from column experiments. Either the equilibrium could not be reached in batch or the two‐site model was not able to describe the wide range of sorption sites present in the highly reactive organic matter and allophane components.

Keywords:

• 2,4‐D Acid
• allophane
• Andosol
• batch
• column
• sorption

Acknowledgments

A major part of this study was conducted during the first author's stay at AgResearch Institute, Hamilton, New Zealand, as a collaborator, via a fellowship under the OECD Co‐operative Research Program “Biological Resource Management for Sustainable Agriculture Systems.”