Moss mites (Acari: Oribatida) in soil revitalizing: a chance for practical application in silviculture

Abstract

The Oribatida (known as moss mites or beetle mites) increase the breakdown of organic material in the soil. The paper analyses the dynamics of their abundance and number of species after various treatments enriching the soil in 4 study areas: afforested post-agricultural area in the Tuchola Forest, afforested degraded post-military training area in Bydgoszcz-Jachcice, and forest nurseries at Białe Błota and Bielawy. The results show that in post-agricultural and degraded soils at the initial stages of forest succession, the density and number of species of oribatid mites were low, even after phyto-land-improvement (afforestation and lupin as green manure). In the forest nurseries, however, we recorded a positive effect of soil revitalizing after mulching with forest ectohumus (i.e. organic surface layer of the soil). The inoculation of soils with forest mesofauna appeared more effective in nursery plantations of silver birch (Betula pendula) and small-leaved lime (Tilia cordata), as compared with Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris). Thus to revitalize degraded soils effectively and to accelerate forest succession, apart from phytoland- improvement, it is advisable also to reintroduce mesofauna, e.g. with the use of forest ectohumus.

Biomass and Diversity of Soil Mite Functional Groups Respond to Extensification of Land Management, Potentially Affecting Soil Ecosystem Services

“…Additional studies, preferably using e.g., reciprocal transplantation and inoculation experiments to test which species arrive and survive under various conditions (e.g., Klimek and Rolbieki, 2014), will be needed to assess exactly which factors drive the observed differences in mite community composition among our study fields. Yet, when combining the results of the Lusignan and Veluwe experiments, we can deduct a few general trends in the abundance and taxon richness of particular mite feeding guilds during early and late succession after conversion from arable land to grassland.…”

Mite communities (Acari: Mesostigmata, Oribatida) in the red belt conk, Fomitopsis pinicola (Polyporales), in Polish forests

“…Anthropogenic pressure can have a strong and negative impact on the forest environment, which naturally also affects mite communities, e.g., soil Uropodina or Oribatida (Błoszyk 1999;Klimek and Rolbiecki 2014). The BNP is an example of an ecosystem with a unique natural structure (Faliński 1986), a large variety of habitats and microhabitats, which is reflected in species richness, also of mites (e.g., Olszanowski and Błoszyk 1998; Typical species names, the parks where they were found (BNP -Białowieża National Park, KNP -Karkonosze National Park), the 'degree of decay' they were associated with (DD 1-4; see Table 1 for explanation), and their abbreviations used in Fig.…”

The Use of Wood Chips for Revitalization of Degraded Forest Soil on Young Scots Pine Plantation

“…In forest ecosystem, many micro-arthropods perform very important soil-forming functions, but one of the most important are oribatid mites. Previous studies have shown that the introduction of a 1-cm thick layer of forest litter into a suitable substrate, e.g., wood chips, is sufficient to inoculate soils with edaphon [25,33,35,36,[39][40][41]. On the one hand, these small animals have limited adaptability to new habitats [42][43][44], but on the other hand, some studies show that oribatid mites appear very early in adverse habitats, even on the glacier foreland [45] or on post-industrial dumps [46].…”

“…Furthermore, oribatid mites (as vectors) have a beneficial influence on the spread of bacteria and fungi, and therefore have an indirect effect on the development of mycorrhiza [12,17,18,47]. The addition of fresh forest litter to reclaimed soil was successfully used already by Klimek and Rolbiecki [32,40], Klimek et al [33], Klimek at al. [36,41], Klimek and Chachaj [25], and Klimek [39].…”