We assessed the effects of canopy position and feral pig disturbance on soil moisture, pH, and inorganic nitrogen concentrations beneath canopies of Quercus agrifolia and surrounding grasslands on Santa Cruz Island, California. Percent soil moisture, pH, nitrate-N, and total inorganic nitrogen varied significantly with canopy position. Soil moisture decreased, and pH increased along transects f...

Analysing the consequences of the decrease in biodiversity for ecosystem functioning and stability has been a major concern in ecology. However, the impact of decline in soil microbial diversity on ecosystem sustainability remains largely unknown. This has been assessed for decomposition, which is insured by a large proportion of the soil microbial community, but not for more specialized and le...

in forest harvesting, there is an ongoing trend to increase constantly the size, power and load of logging machines. this may cause soil degradation in forest ecosystems as the passes of these machines modify important soil structural characteristics. the present study was conducted to examine impact of skidding traffic, trail slope, traffic frequency, and soil depth on bulk density and soil co...

Seed-caching rodents have long been seen as important actors in dispersal ecology. Here, we focus on the interactions with plants in a fire-disturbance community, specifically Arctostaphylos species (Ericaceae) in California chaparral. Although mutualistic relationships between caching rodents and plants are well studied, little is known how this type of relationship functions in a disturbance-...

Reducing the tillage of agricultural soils can increase early-season crop-P uptake. Consistent increases in plant-P have been found in both fieldand laboratory-systems with undisturbed (U) compared to disturbed (D) soil. A concomitant stimulatory effect on colonization of roots in U soil by arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) fungi has been found in some cases, but in others the colonization has been s...

2 Executive Summary Tropical forest systems occupy 2% of the earth's land surface but host nearly 50% of the world's forests and support unique flora and fauna and ecological processes. They also provide a multitude of ecosystem services ranging from the provision of food and water to supporting livelihoods and climate change mitigation. However, tropical forests are under immense anthropogenic...

Progress in understanding changes in soil biology in response to latitude, elevation and disturbance gradients has generally lagged behind studies of above-ground plants and animals owing to methodological constraints and high diversity and complexity of interactions in below-ground food webs. New methods have opened research opportunities in below-ground systems, leading to a rapid increase in...

With the population growth and consequently the requirement for development of civil constructions, it is necessary to design appropriate foundations for resisting structural loads. Soil weakness in bearing capacity of geotechnical elements has forced the researchers to continuously follow a solution to compensate for this deficiency. Within the past two decades, many studies have been carried ...

Long-term rotation experiments were established at five sites (Tully, Ingham, Ayr, Mackay and Bundaberg) in sugar growing areas of coastal Queensland, Australia in 1993 and 1994. The rotations or breaks consisted of either pasture, crop other than sugarcane, or bare fallow for various periods of time ranging from 6 to 42 months. The type of break established three basic soil management strategi...

To better understand the effects of biological soil crusts (BSCs) on soil moisture and wind erosion and study the necessity and feasibility of disturbance of BSCs in the Mu Us sandland, the effects of four treatments, including moss-dominated crusts alone, Artemisia ordosica alone, bare sand, and Artemisia ordosica combined with moss-dominated crusts, on rainwater infiltration, soil moisture, a...