Search results
Results From The WOW.Com Content Network
Soil ecology. Soil ecology is the study of the interactions among soil organisms, and between biotic and abiotic aspects of the soil environment. [1] It is particularly concerned with the cycling of nutrients, formation and stabilization of the pore structure, the spread and vitality of pathogens, and the biodiversity of this rich biological ...
The soil food web is the community of organisms living all or part of their lives in the soil. It describes a complex living system in the soil and how it interacts with the environment, plants, and animals. Food webs describe the transfer of energy between species in an ecosystem. While a food chain examines one, linear, energy pathway through ...
The minerals and nutrients in the soil is recycled back into the production of crops. A nutrient cycle (or ecological recycling) is the movement and exchange of inorganic and organic matter back into the production of matter. Energy flow is a unidirectional and noncyclic pathway, whereas the movement of mineral nutrients is cyclic.
Soil microbiology. Soil microbiology is the study of microorganisms in soil, their functions, and how they affect soil properties. [1] It is believed that between two and four billion years ago, the first ancient bacteria and microorganisms came about on Earth's oceans.
Soil biology is the study of microbial and faunal activity and ecology in soil. Soil life , soil biota , soil fauna , or edaphon is a collective term that encompasses all organisms that spend a significant portion of their life cycle within a soil profile, or at the soil- litter interface.
The biological soil crust is an integral part of many arid and semi-arid ecosystems as an essential contributor to conditions such as dust control, water acquisition, and contributors of soil nutrients. Biocrust is poikilohydric and does not have the ability to maintain or regulate its own water retention. [ 12]
A freshwater aquatic food web. The blue arrows show a complete food chain (algae → daphnia → gizzard shad → largemouth bass → great blue heron). A food web is the natural interconnection of food chains and a graphical representation of what-eats-what in an ecological community.
The physical properties of soil, in order of decreasing importance for ecosystem services such as crop production, are texture, structure, bulk density, porosity, consistency, temperature, colour and resistivity. [ 1] Soil texture is determined by the relative proportion of the three kinds of soil mineral particles, called soil separates: sand ...