LakePulse Network : Carbon burial, sediment mass accumulation rates, sediment carbon content and related environmental data (Canada, 2017-2019), associated to the paper “Continental scale patterns and drivers of organic and inorganic carbon burial in lakes across Canada”, by Aulard et al.

The purpose of this dataset was to assess patterns in sediment C burial in lakes across Canada, to determine drivers of lake C burial at the continental scale, and to place lake C burial within the context of the landscape C balance. The database contains core sediment geochemical data, and complementary limnological, watershed land use, climate data for 105 lakes across Canada. Sediment cores and limnological samples were collected during summer months of 2017, 2018, and 2019 as part of the LakePulse Network research program. Watershed and lake morphometry variables were determined from the Canadian Digital Elevation Model dataset, catchments characteristics were extracted from Geological Survey of Canada, https://doi.org/10.4095/208175, soil type from Soil Landscape of Canada v.2.2 https://sis.agr.gc.ca/cansis/nsdb/slc/v2.2/index.html. Historical land use and historical climate were extracted using remote sensing after watershed delineation from respectively https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/metadata/geoportal/rest/metadata/item/gov.noaa.ncdc:C00814/html# and https://cds.climate.copernicus.eu/datasets/reanalysis-era5-land?tab=overview. Sediment core geochemical data, sediment mass accumulation rates (MAR), C content, C burial rate correspond to the core average from the period 1950-2010. MAR was derived from 210Pb chronologies using the CRS dating model; C content (total, organic and inorganic) was measured with an elemental analyzer, and inorganic and organic C burial rates were calculated using MAR x C content. MAR and C burial rate were corrected for sediment focusing (MAR_corrected, C_MAR_corrected). Focusing factor was calculated using the ratio of measured inventory in the sediment core and atmospheric deposition, the latter from Government of Canada radiological Monitoring (https://open.canada.ca/data/en/dataset/de113672-d813-4a88-965a-d99922485812).