Journal
ECOLOGICAL COMPLEXITY AND SUSTAINABILITY
Volume 1195, Issue S1, Pages E74-E81Publisher
WILEY-BLACKWELL
DOI: 10.1111/j.1749-6632.2009.05404.x
Keywords
mass-abundance relationships; soil invertebrates; allometry
Funding
- RIVM Directorate [QERAS S860703, EIA S/607001]
- Scientific Advisory Committee of the Netherlands Ministry of Housing, Spatial Planning, and Environment (VROM)
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The large range of body-mass values of soil organisms provides a tool to assess the organization of soil ecological communities. Relationships between log-transformed body mass M and log-transformed numerical abundance N of all eukaryotes occurring under organic pastures, mature grasslands, and seminatural heathlands in the Netherlands were investigated. The observed allometry of (M, N) assemblages of below-ground communities strongly reflects the availability of primary macronutrients and essential micronutrients. This log-linear model describes the continuous variation in the allometric slope of animals and fungi along an increasing soil fertility gradient. The aggregate contribution of small invertebrates (M < 1 mu g) to the entire faunal community is highest under nutrient deficiency and causes shifts in the mass-abundance relationships. The phosphorus concentration in the soil explains 72% of these shifts but the nitrogen concentration explains only 36%, with copper and zinc as intermediate predictors (59% and 49%, respectively). Empirical evidence supports common responses of invertebrates to the rates of resource supply and, possibly, to the above-ground primary production of ecosystems.
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