Soil fauna as an indicator of soil quality in forest stands, pasture and secondary forest

Abstract

SUMMARYThe interactions between soil invertebrates and environmental variations are relatively unknown in the assessment of soil quality. The objective of this study was to evaluate soil quality in areas with different soil management systems, based on soil fauna as indicator, in Além Paraíba, Minas Gerais, Brazil. The soil invertebrate community was sampled using pitfall traps, in the dry and rainy seasons, from areas with five vegetation types (acacia, mimosa, eucalyptus, pasture, and secondary forest). The abundance of organisms and the total and average richness, Shannon's diversity index, the Pielou uniformity index, and change index V were determined. The fauna was most abundant in the areas of secondary forest and mimosa plantations in the dry season (111.3 and 31.7 individuals per trap per day, respectively). In the rainy season, the abundance of organisms in the three vegetation types did not differ. The highest values of average and total richness were recorded in the secondary forest in the dry season and in the mimosa stand in the rainy season. Shannon's index ranged from 1.57 in areas with acacia and eucalyptus in the rainy season to 3.19 in the eucalyptus area in the dry season. The uniformity index was highest in forest stands (eucalyptus, acacia and mimosa) in the dry season, but higher in the rainy season in the pasture and secondary forest than in the forest stands. The change index V indicated that the percentage of extremely inhibited groups was lowest in the area with mimosa, both in the dry and rainy season (36 and 23 %, respectively). Of all forest stands, the mimosa area had the most abundant soil fauna.

Land Use Intensification Effects in Soil Arthropod Community of an Entisol in Pernambuco State, Brazil

“…Several factors may influence the soil invertebrate community, particularly season, microclimate, soil, and crop management, and resource availability [16, 17, 21]. With regard to the season, indeed rainfall might contribute to a more favorable environment for fauna activity at the semiarid region of northeast Brazil.…”

Alteration in soil fauna due to soil management and crop rotation in a long-term experiment

“…In this sense, the greater and lesser density of edaphic fauna found in April/2013 and January/2014 (Table 3), respectively, is justified in part. A number of researchers have reported on the relationship of SM to the diversity and density of the fauna (CUNHA-NETO et al 2012;ABREU et al 2014;GARLET et al 2015). Machado et al (2015) reported the highest number of organisms during periods of higher rainfall, but when they investigated the edaphic fauna in a fragment of the Semideciduous Seasonal Forest in Rio de Janeiro, they found fewer faunal representatives in the dry season, as it also was found in this inquire.…”

Epigeal Fauna and Soil Chemical Attributes in Grazing and Regeneration Areas

“…The presence of one or more groups may be indicative of the quality of a specific environment even if the frequency of their occurrence is low (Cunha-Neto et al, 2012;Machado et al, 2015). The group classified as "Others" had low ratios in all areas evaluated, with percentages below 7%, as observed in the forest area in the dry season (Figure 2).…”