Inorganic chemical investigations in the forest biosphere reserve near Kalinin,USSR

Lanthanides (rare-earth elements) were quantitatively determined by atomic emission spectrometry/inductively coupled plasma (AES/ICP) in various plants (Picea abies, Vaccinium vitis-idaea, Vaccinium myrtillus, Polytrichum commune, Sphagnum spec., and Hypogymna physodes) collected in the Forest Biosphere Reserve 350 km northwest of Moscow (USSR). Compared with previously established background values for lanthanide elements in central Europe, the rare elements determined in the USSR samples appear in lower concentrations. The lichen Hypogymna physodes can be characterized as an extreme accumulator of lanthanide elements up to a factor of ten compared to the other plant species collected in the Forest Biosphere Reserve. With regard to the lanthanide contents in plants collected in a German reference forest ecosystem, it can be seen, that the German samples represent without exception higher lanthanide values. Leaves of Vaccinium vitis-idaea display contents 3–4 times higher, leaves of Vaccinium myrtillus show concentrations higher by a factor of about 0.3, approximately twice the contents were determined in the German samples of Polytrichum formosum and P. commune, and the values in the German samples of the Sphagnum species are about 3 times that of the Soviet samples. As pointed out for pollution by heavy metals in part I of this series, the Forest Biosphere Reserve is generally characterized by lower contents of lanthanides in the vegetation cover than a comparable forest ecosystem (Grasmoor near Osnabrück, F.R.G.) in central Europe.