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Nachusa Grasslands

Celebrating World Soil Day at Nachusa

12/5/2018

2 Comments

 
By Dr. Elizabeth Bach, Ecosystem Restoration Scientist
Picture
Photo by E. Bach
December 5 is World Soil Day, a time to recognize the vital role soils play in our ecosystems and health: growing food, filtering water, recycling air, mitigating climate change, and supporting more than 25% of all biodiversity! Soil is the foundation of prairie restoration at Nachusa Grasslands, the starting point of a prairie planting. There are many questions about how soils impact prairie restoration success and how prairie restoration affects soils. Today, we highlight a few of the soil-focused scientific studies that have been conducted at Nachusa Grasslands:
 
Question: Do communities of soil critters like earthworms, ants, ground beetles, centipedes, millipedes, and spiders change during prairie restoration?
 
Answers:
Prairie restoration increases the number, abundance, and mass of soil critters like earthworms, ants, centipedes, and spiders with time since planting. Interestingly, different prairie remnants, even within the Nachusa preserve, have very different communities of soil invertebrates, and it’s difficult to know what a typical remnant invertebrate community may look like.
 
Wodika & Baer 2015. If we build it, will they colonize? A test of the field of dreams paradigm with soil macroinvertebrate communities. Applied Soil Ecology 91:80-89
 
Wodika et al. 2014. Colonization and recovery of invertebrate ecosystem engineers during prairie restoration. Restoration Ecology 22: 456-464

 
Ground beetles show a different pattern, with high numbers of species and abundance in young plantings. Although older plantings had lower species richness, the roles those species play in the ecosystem diverged, indicating that older plantings support stable, diverse beetle communities that fill multiple roles in the ecosystem (e.g. different sizes, active at different parts of the day/night, eating different things).
 
Barber et al. 2017. Species and functional trait re-assembly of ground beetle communities in restored grasslands. Biodiversity and Conservation 26:3481-3498
 
Question: Do soil microbial communities change during prairie restoration?
 
Answer:
Older restorations at Nachusa host microbial communities that are distinct from younger plantings, and that more closely resemble remnant communities. A couple of the key bacterial groups distinctive of prairie remnants and older restorations are Verrucomicrobia and Acidobacteria. The next question is to learn more about what those bacteria do!
 
Barber et al. 2017. Soil microbial community composition in tallgrass prairie restorations converge with remnants across a 27-year chronosequence. Environmental Microbiology 19: 3118-3131
 
Question: How does plant diversity impact ecosystem functions like soil carbon and nitrogen cycling?
 
Answer:
Nachusa’s high plant diversity restorations had more roots, more microbial mass (especially mycorrhizal fungi), more structured soil, and less “leaky” nitrogen compounds that can wind up in water ways compared with low plant diversity restorations in the same area. This is the first study to show that very high plant diversity restoration can lead to improved ecosystem functioning.
 
Klopf et al. 2017. Restoration and management for plant diversity enhances the rate of belowground ecosystem recovery. Ecological Applications 27:355-362
2 Comments
Michelle link
2/25/2022 02:59:35 am

Thanks for sharing this useful information! Hope that you will continue with the kind of stuff you are doing.

Reply
Michelle link
2/25/2022 05:30:50 am

Great Article! Thank you for sharing this is very informative post, and looking forward to the latest one.

Reply

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Leave a Reply.

    Blog Coordinator

    Dee Hudson
    I am a nature photographer, a freelance graphic designer, and steward at Nachusa's Thelma Carpenter Prairie. I have taken photos for Nachusa since 2012.

    Editor

    James Higby
    I have been a high school French teacher, registered piano technician, and librarian. In retirement I am a volunteer historian at Lee County Historical and Genealogical Society. 

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© 2022 FRIENDS OF NACHUSA GRASSLANDS
  • Home
  • About Friends
    • Mission and Leadership
    • Endowments
    • Heritage Heroes Initiative
    • Friends Annual Reports
    • Newsletters >
      • PrairiE–Update (email)
      • A Prairie Calling (print and digital)
    • Commenting Policy
    • Friends Annual Meeting 2021
  • Plan Your Visit
    • Hours & Parking
    • Directions and Map
    • Visitor Center
    • Public Bison Tours
    • Pet Policy
    • Hiking >
      • Hiking Guidelines
      • Hiking Destinations
      • Stone Barn Savanna Tour
      • Visitor Center Trail
      • Scavenger Hunt
    • What's In Bloom?
    • Bison Viewing
    • Exploring Nachusa Grasslands on Your Own
    • Things to Do
    • Places to Eat and Stay
    • Local Sites to Visit and Explore
  • Donate
  • Calendar
  • Volunteer
    • Volunteer Opportunities
    • Thursday and Saturday Workdays
    • Stewardship Teams
    • Workdays – November to February
    • Workday Email List
    • Steward Login
  • Stewardship
    • Nachusa Stewardship
    • Restorations
    • Planting Histories >
      • Stewardship Unit Planting Histories
      • Planting Histories in Chronological Order
    • Stewards and Staff
    • Groups and Committees
    • Available Units
    • Controlled Burns
    • Prescribed Fire Recruitment
    • Restoration Publications
    • Stewardship Resources >
      • Weekly Top Picks
      • Seed Collection Guides
      • Invasive Plant Management
      • Invasive Identification
      • Monitoring
      • Links & Resources
  • Science
    • Science at Nachusa Grasslands
    • Science Symposium 2022
    • Science Symposium Abstracts >
      • Science Symposium Abstracts 2019
      • Science Symposium Abstracts 2018
      • Science Symposium Abstracts 2017
      • Science Symposium Abstracts 2016
    • Science Grants >
      • Science Grants 2022
      • Science Grants 2021
      • Science Grants 2020
      • Science Grants 2019
      • Science Grants 2018
      • Science Grants 2017
      • Science Grants 2016
      • Science Grants 2015
      • Science Grants 2014
      • Science Grants 2013/2012/2011
    • Potential Research Topics
    • Scientific Publications
    • Testimonials >
      • Dr. Holly Jones
      • Dr. Nick Barber
      • Kimberly Elsenbroek
    • Science Videos
    • Become a Citizen Scientist >
      • About Citizen Scientists
      • Butterfly Monitoring
      • Calling Frog Monitoring
      • Dragonflies & Damselflies
      • RiverWatch
  • About Nachusa
    • General Info
    • Prairie Smoke Annual Reports
    • Plant Inventory >
      • Common Names
      • Genus Species
    • Animal Inventory >
      • Amphibians
      • Birds
      • Bison Bison >
        • Bison
        • Bison Babies Broadcast Videos
      • Fish
      • Insects
      • Mammals
      • Other Arthropods
      • Reptiles
    • History
    • Jobs
    • Hunting
    • Geology >
      • Geology Part 1
      • Geology Part 2
      • Geology Part 3
    • 30th Anniversary Memories
    • Websites of Interest
  • BLOG AND MEDIA
    • Nachusa Blog
    • In The News
    • Photo Gallery >
      • Spring Photos
      • Summer Photos
      • Autumn Photos
      • Winter Photos
      • Visitor Photos
    • Submit Your Photos
    • Videos
  • Contact Us / FAQs