Global distribution of earthworm diversity

Phillips, Helen R. P.; Guerra, Carlos A.; Bartz, Marie Luise Carolina; Briones, M. J. I.; Brown, G. G.; Ferlian, Olga; Gongalsk, Konstantin; Krebs, Julia; Orgiazzi, Alberto; Schwarz, Benjamin; Bach, Elizabeth M.; Bennett, Joanne M.; Brose, Ulrich; Decaëns, Thibaud; Vries, Franciska T. de; König‐Ries, Birgitta; Lavelle, Patrick; Loreau, Michel; Mathieu, Jérôme; Mulder, Christian; Putten, Wim H. van der; Ramirez, Kelly S.; Rillig, Matthias C.; Russell, David J.; Rutgers, Michiel; Thakur, Madhav P.; Wall, Diana H.; Wardle, David A.; Cameron, Erin K.; Eisenhauer, Nico

doi:10.1101/587394

Cited by 65 publications

(113 citation statements)

References 34 publications

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“…Soil properties are the primary drivers of soil nematode abundance, whereas climatic conditions have an indirect effect by altering soil conditions 6 . The overall latitudinal gradient, with decreasing abundance towards the equator, is the inverse of patterns often observed in aboveground organisms, but is in line with what has been shown for other belowground biota 7,8 .…”

Section: Background and Summarysupporting

confidence: 87%

A global database of soil nematode abundance and functional group composition

et al. 2020

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a global database of soil nematode abundance and functional group composition Johan van den Hoogen et al. # as the most abundant animals on earth, nematodes are a dominant component of the soil community. they play critical roles in regulating biogeochemical cycles and vegetation dynamics within and across landscapes and are an indicator of soil biological activity. Here, we present a comprehensive global dataset of soil nematode abundance and functional group composition. This dataset includes 6,825 georeferenced soil samples from all continents and biomes. For geospatial mapping purposes these samples are aggregated into 1,933 unique 1-km pixels, each of which is linked to 73 global environmental covariate data layers. Altogether, this dataset can help to gain insight into the spatial distribution patterns of soil nematode abundance and community composition, and the environmental drivers shaping these patterns.

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Section: Background and Summarysupporting

confidence: 87%

A global database of soil nematode abundance and functional group composition

et al. 2020

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“…Nematode abundances, for instance, increase with an increase in SOC content and decline with increasing soil pH at a global scale (Van Den Hoogen et al 2019). Global earthworm communities, on the other hand, have been more strongly linked to climatic variables (Phillips et al 2019). Soil acidity also influences global earthworm communities across natural and managed ecosystems, with higher species richness at intermediate soil pH values (Johnston 2019).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…For instance, a global litter decomposition study found the influence of soil animals to be climate dependent (Wall et al 2008). Recent global syntheses of soil animal groups further identify climate as an important driver of nematode (Van Den Hoogen et al 2019) and earthworm (Johnston 2019;Phillips et al 2019) community metrics. Yet, inconsistent observations from soil warming experiments suggest that climate effects on soil animals are subsidiary to resource effects at the community and site level (Ernakovich et al 2014;Thakur et al 2014;Dorrepaal et al 2016;Robinson et al 2018).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Multiple environmental controls explain global patterns in soil animal communities

Johnston

Sibly

2020

Oecologia

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Soil animals play important roles in ecosystem functioning and stability, but the environmental controls on their communities are not fully understood. In this study, we compiled a dataset of soil animal communities for which the abundance and body mass of multiple soil animal groups were recorded. The mass-abundance scaling relationships were then used to investigate multiple environmental controls on soil animal community composition. The data reveal latitudinal shifts from high abundances of small soil animals at high latitudes to greater relative abundances of large soil animals at low latitudes. A hierarchical linear mixed effects model was applied to reveal the environmental variables shaping these latitudinal trends. The final hierarchical model identified mean annual temperature, soil pH and soil organic carbon content as key environmental controls explaining global mass-abundance scaling relationships in soil animal communities (R 2 c = 0.828, N group = 117). Such relationships between soil biota with climate and edaphic conditions have been previously identified for soil microbial, but not soil animal, communities at a global scale. More comprehensive global soil community datasets are needed to better understand the generality of these relationships over a broader range of global ecosystems and soil animal groups.

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“…Increasing soil temperatures and predicted formation of year-round unfrozen soil layers (talik) in the near future 24 offer examples of potential niches opening in areas where frozen soils have previously limited earthworm establishment. In addition, recent models assessing both soil properties as well as climatic conditions predict that large areas in the Arctic are already suitable for several earthworm species 25 . In other ecosystems, some plants can be negatively affected by earthworm activities 26 , which makes the impact of geoengineering earthworms in tundra plant-soil systems largely speculative given the current lack of empirical studies.…”

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confidence: 99%

Invasive earthworms unlock arctic plant nitrogen limitation

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Arctic plant growth is predominantly nitrogen (N) limited. This limitation is generally attributed to slow soil microbial processes due to low temperatures. Here, we show that arctic plant-soil N cycling is also substantially constrained by the lack of larger detritivores (earthworms) able to mineralize and physically translocate litter and soil organic matter. These new functions provided by earthworms increased shrub and grass N concentration in our common garden experiment. Earthworm activity also increased either the height or number of floral shoots, while enhancing fine root production and vegetation greenness in heath and meadow communities to a level that exceeded the inherent differences between these two common arctic plant communities. Moreover, these worming effects on plant N and greening exceeded reported effects of warming, herbivory and nutrient addition, suggesting that human spreading of earthworms may lead to substantial changes in the structure and function of arctic ecosystems.

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Global distribution of earthworm diversity

Cited by 65 publications

References 34 publications

A global database of soil nematode abundance and functional group composition

A global database of soil nematode abundance and functional group composition

Multiple environmental controls explain global patterns in soil animal communities

Invasive earthworms unlock arctic plant nitrogen limitation

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