Effects of field metal-contaminated soils submitted to phytostabilisation and fly ash-aided phytostabilisation on the avoidance behaviour of the earthworm Eisenia fetida

Abstract

The earthworm Eisenia fetida avoidance behaviour test was used to assess the quality recovery of metal-contaminated soils from lands submitted for 10 years to remediation. Soils were from plots located in the surroundings of a former lead smelter plant of Northern France. Metal concentrations in the soils ranged from 93 to 1231, 56 to 1424, 0.3 to 20 and 15 to 45.5mg metal/kg dry soil for Pb, Zn, Cd and Cu, respectively. Several former agricultural plots were treated either by a single phytostabilisation process involving the plantation of a tree mix or by fly ash aided-phytostabilisation. Silico-aluminous or sulfo-calcic ashes used were ploughed up to a 25- to 30-cm soil depth at a rate of 23.3kg/m2 (i.e., 6 percent W/W). E. fetida was shown to avoid significantly the 10 years ash-treated soils whose habitat function has to be considered as limited. This avoidance would relate to a change of the texture of soils induced by the addition of ashes and consisting in an increased level of fine silts together with a decreased level of clays. By contrast, afforested metal-contaminated soils appeared for E. fetida as more attractive than unplanted ones. Regarding the influence of the metal contamination of the soils on E. fetida, none of the soils tested even the highest contaminated one was significantly avoided by worms. This lack of reaction would result from the low bioavailability of the metals in the soils tested. At the lights of our results and those previously published on both these ashes and these ash-treated soils, the usefulness of these soil treatments is discussed.