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Chinese Journal of Applied Ecology ›› 2012, Vol. 23 ›› Issue (09): 2459-2466.

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Characteristics of soil macrofaunal community structure in secondary forest and forest plantations in western Qinling Mountains of Northwest China.

LIU Ji-liang1, CAO Jing2, LI Shi-jie2, PAN Chun-lin3, PAN Cheng-chen1   

  1. (1Laboratory of Ecology and Agriculture, Cold and Arid Regions Environmental and Engineering Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Lanzhou 730000, China; 2 School of Life Sciences, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou 730000, China; 3Xiaolongshan Research Institute of Forestry, Tianshui 741022, Gansu, China)
  • Online:2012-09-18 Published:2012-09-18

Abstract: Long-term disturbance of human beings on secondary forest ecosystem would have profound impacts on belowground ecological processes, whereas the community structure and functional diversity of soil fauna would be sensitive to the changes of belowground ecological processes, with significance as an indicator of the changes. In this study, the method of handsorting was adopted to investigate the density of soil macrofaunal community in a secondary forest and the Pinus tabulaeformis, Larix kaempferi, Picea abie, and Picea asperata plantations of nearly 30 years old in Xiaolongshan forest area of western Qinling Mountains, and the PCA ordination and oneway ANOVA analysis were applied to analyze the community structure and trophic group composition of soil macrofauna in the five forest types. In the P. tabulaeformis and L. kaempferi plantations, the density of soil macrofaunal community was 3.0 and 2.1 times of that in the secondary forest, respectively, and the consumers/decomposers ratio of the community was obviously higher than that in the secondary forest. Among the plantations, P. tabulaeformis and L. kaempferi plantations had a significantly higher consumers/decomposers ratio of soil macrofaunal community than P. abies and P. asperata plantations. There was an obvious difference in community structure of soil macrofauna among the four plantations. The density of soil macrofaunal community in P. tabulaeformis and L. kaempferi plantations was 3.5 and 2.1 times higher than that in P. asperata plantation, respectively, whereas the group richness of soil macrofaunal community in P. tabulaeformis plantation was 1.5 times of that in P. abies and P. asperata plantations.