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Horseshoe Lake, in Mammoth Lakes, California, had a substantial CO2 vent in the early 2000s: http://pubs.usgs.gov/fs/fs172-96/ http://pubs.usgs.gov/fs/fs172-96/
by Diederich 10y ago
Horseshoe Lake, in Mammoth Lakes, California, had a substantial CO2 vent in the early 2000s:
http://pubs.usgs.gov/fs/fs172-96/ http://pubs.usgs.gov/fs/fs172-96/
300 tons per day at the time.
I visited in 2002. There were danger signs everywhere, advising people to stay away from the lake itself, and away from low-lying depressions.
In such forested areas, there is always a background of natural sounds, but that day, there was almost complete silence. Large swathes of trees, especially those nearer the lake itself, were standing, dead and dying. I found a couple of dead birds on the ground, completely undisturbed.
The whole situation was so eerie that I bugged out even without taking any pictures.
- DigitalJack 10y agoWhat killed the trees? Was the water acidic from the CO2?
- zymhan 10y agoFrom the article: > Although leaves of plants produce oxygen (O2) from CO2 during photosynthesis, their roots need to absorb O2 directly. The high CO2 concentrations in the soil on Mammoth Mountain are killing trees by denying their roots O2 and by interfering with nutrient uptake. In the areas of tree kill, CO2 makes up about 20 to 95% of the gas content of the soil; soil gas normally contains 1% or less CO2.
- m_mueller 10y agoIs the O2 intake needed by fungi that interact with the tree? Or is it really the plant's own organism?
- science4sail 10y agoThe O2 is consumed by the plant - root cells are dependent on aerobic respiration for their energy.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- kpil 10y agoThank you. It's somewhat glossed over in that plants have aerobic metabolism, but uses CO2 to build the fuel for the process. I am not certain if the green parts will survive at at night time if there is no oxygen in the air.
- mcpherrinm 10y agoI visited last year. There's still large quantities of standing dead trees, and it seems like the other vegetation never quite recovered. The danger signs were quite spooky.