The accumulation of heavy metals in crops is largely dependent on the availability of heavy metals in soils. Due to the differences of soil types and pollution characteristics, there is no widely recognized method for the determination of the bio-available heavy metals in soils such as Pb and Cd. In order to screen and establish suitable methods, the extractable abilities of five extractants (CaCl2, NH4OAc, HCl, EDTA, and DTPA) and Gradient Diffusion Film Technology (DGT) on four typical farmland soils with very different properties in Chongqing (acid purple soil, neutral purple soil, calcareous yellow soil and calcareous purple soil) were systematically compared. Simultaneously, pot experiments were carried out with Lolium perenne L. as an indicator plant to explore the relationship between the extractable soil Pb and Cd and their accumulation in plants. The feasibility of the tested methods were evaluated based on the extractability and co-relationships. The results showed that the extractability of the tested extractants for soil Pb and Cd varied a lot. HCl showed highest extractability on Pb in acid purple soil and calcareous yellow soil, while EDTA did the best in neutral purple soil and calcareous purple soil; HCl showed best extractability in all soils except calcareous purple soil, where EDTA was the best. Considering the correlation between the extraction amount and uptake by plant, all the extraction methods could be applied for the evaluation of the bioavailability of soils Pb and Cd except CaCl2 for Pb due to its weak extractability for Pb for a specific soil type. For the comparison of heavy bioavailability in different soil types, EDTA-extractable Pb and DGT-extractable Cd were recommended due to their well co-relationships between extractable amount in soil and uptake by plant (Lolium perenne L.) as indicated by the correlation coefficients of 0.941 and 0.919, respectively. HCl was relatively suitable as Cd extractant compared to others if DGT method could not be used.
Keywords: Lolium perenne L.; availability; cadmium; farmland soil; lead.