TY - JOUR

T1 - A method of establishing a transect for biodiversity and ecosystem function monitoring across Europe

T2 - Soil biodiversity and ecosystem functions across Europe: A transect covering variations in bio-geographical zones, land use and soil properties

AU - Stone, D.

AU - Blomkvist, P.

AU - Hendriksen, N.Bohse

AU - Bonkowski, M.

AU - Jørgensen, H.Bracht

AU - Carvalho, F.

AU - Dunbar, M.B.

AU - Gardi, C.

AU - Geisen, S.

AU - Griffiths, R.

AU - Hug, A.S.

AU - Jensen, J.

AU - Laudon, H.

AU - Mendes, S.

AU - Morais, P.V.

AU - Orgiazzi, A.

AU - Plassart, P.

AU - Römbke, J.

AU - Rutgers, M.

AU - Schmelz, R.M.

AU - Sousa, J.P.

AU - Steenbergen, E.

AU - Suhadolc, M.

AU - Winding, A.

AU - Zupan, M.

AU - Lemanceau, P.

AU - Creamer, R.E.

PY - 2016/1

Y1 - 2016/1

N2 - The establishment of the range of soil biodiversity found within European soils is needed to guide EU policy development regarding the protection of soil. Such a base-line should be collated from a wide-ranging sampling campaign to ensure that soil biodiversity from the majority of soil types, land-use or management systems, and European climatic (bio-geographical zones) were included. This paper reports the design and testing of a method to achieve the large scale sampling associated with the establishment of such a baseline, carried out within the remit of the EcoFINDERS project, and outlines points to consider when such a task is undertaken. Applying a GIS spatial selection process, a sampling campaign was undertaken by 13 EcoFINDERS partners across 11 countries providing data on the range of indicators of biodiversity and ecosystem functions including; micro and meso fauna biodiversity, extracellular enzyme activity, PLFA and community level physiological profiling (MicroResp™ and Biolog™). Physical, chemical and bio-geographical parameters of the 81 sites sampled were used to determine whether the model predicted a wide enough range of sites to allow assessment of the biodiversity indicators tested. Discrimination between the major bio-geographical zones of Atlantic and Continental was possible for all land-use types. Boreal and Alpine zones only allowed discrimination in the most common land-use type for that area e.g. forestry and grassland sites, respectively, while the Mediterranean zone did not have enough sites sampled to draw conclusions across all land-use types. The method used allowed the inclusion of a range of land-uses in both the model prediction stage and the final sites sampled. The establishment of the range of soil biodiversity across Europe is possible, though a larger targeted campaign is recommended. The techniques applied within the EcoFINDERS sampling would be applicable to a larger campaign.

AB - The establishment of the range of soil biodiversity found within European soils is needed to guide EU policy development regarding the protection of soil. Such a base-line should be collated from a wide-ranging sampling campaign to ensure that soil biodiversity from the majority of soil types, land-use or management systems, and European climatic (bio-geographical zones) were included. This paper reports the design and testing of a method to achieve the large scale sampling associated with the establishment of such a baseline, carried out within the remit of the EcoFINDERS project, and outlines points to consider when such a task is undertaken. Applying a GIS spatial selection process, a sampling campaign was undertaken by 13 EcoFINDERS partners across 11 countries providing data on the range of indicators of biodiversity and ecosystem functions including; micro and meso fauna biodiversity, extracellular enzyme activity, PLFA and community level physiological profiling (MicroResp™ and Biolog™). Physical, chemical and bio-geographical parameters of the 81 sites sampled were used to determine whether the model predicted a wide enough range of sites to allow assessment of the biodiversity indicators tested. Discrimination between the major bio-geographical zones of Atlantic and Continental was possible for all land-use types. Boreal and Alpine zones only allowed discrimination in the most common land-use type for that area e.g. forestry and grassland sites, respectively, while the Mediterranean zone did not have enough sites sampled to draw conclusions across all land-use types. The method used allowed the inclusion of a range of land-uses in both the model prediction stage and the final sites sampled. The establishment of the range of soil biodiversity across Europe is possible, though a larger targeted campaign is recommended. The techniques applied within the EcoFINDERS sampling would be applicable to a larger campaign.

KW - Monitoring

KW - Soil biodiversity

KW - Ecosystem function

KW - Range of soil biodiversity

KW - Europe

KW - Soil

KW - Standard operating procedures

U2 - 10.1016/j.apsoil.2015.06.017

DO - 10.1016/j.apsoil.2015.06.017

M3 - Article

VL - 97

SP - 3

EP - 11

JO - Applied Soil Ecology

JF - Applied Soil Ecology

SN - 0929-1393

ER -