Differential contribution of soil biota groups to plant litter decomposition as mediated by soil use
- Published
- Accepted
- Subject Areas
- Agricultural Science, Ecology, Soil Science
- Keywords
- litterbags, organic matter turnover, soil use, soil fauna, agroecosystem, soil sustainability, litter decomposition
- Copyright
- © 2014 Casttro-Huerta et al.
- Licence
- This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, reproduction and adaptation in any medium and for any purpose provided that it is properly attributed. For attribution, the original author(s), title, publication source (PeerJ PrePrints) and either DOI or URL of the article must be cited.
- Cite this article
- (2014) Differential contribution of soil biota groups to plant litter decomposition as mediated by soil use. PeerJ PrePrints 2:e710v1 https://doi.org/10.7287/peerj.preprints.710v1
Abstract
Plant decomposition is dependant on the activity of the soil biota and its interactions with climate, soil properties, and plant residue inputs. This work assessed the roles of different groups of the soil biota on litter decomposition, and the way they are modulated by soil use. Litterbags of different mesh sizes were filled with standardized dried leaves and placed on the same soil different use intensities: Naturalized grasslands, recent agriculture, and intensive agriculture fields. During sixth months, litterbags of each mesh size were collected once a month per system with five replicates. The remaining mass was measured and decomposition rates calculated. Differences were found for the different biota groups, and they were dependant on soil use. Within systems, the results show that in the naturalized grasslands, the macrofauna had the highest contribution to decomposition. In the recent agricultural system it was the combined activity of the macro and mesofauna, and in the intensive agricultural use it was the mesofauna activity. These results underscore the relative importance and activity of the different groups of the edaphic biota and the effects of different soil uses on soil biota activity.
Author Comment
This manuscript is intended for later submission to PeerJ.
Supplemental Information
Castro-Huerta et al raw data
Remaining mass for all treatments and sampling dates