Impacts of Invasive Earthworms on Soil Mercury Cycling: Two Mass Balance Approaches to an Earthworm Invasion in a Northern Minnesota Forest

2016 ◽  
Vol 227 (6) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sona Psarska ◽  
Edward A. Nater ◽  
Randall K. Kolka
Keyword(s):  
Mass Balance ◽  
Mercury Cycling ◽  
Earthworm Invasion ◽  
Invasive Earthworms ◽  
Soil Mercury

scholarly journals Aboveground impacts of a belowground invader: how invasive earthworms alter aboveground arthropod communities in a northern North American forest

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Malte Jochum ◽  
Lise Thouvenot ◽  
Olga Ferlian ◽  
Romy Zeiss ◽  
Bernhard Klarner ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Species Richness ◽  
Structural Equation ◽  
Structural Equation Models ◽  
Trophic Levels ◽  
Arthropod Community ◽  
Arthropod Communities ◽  
Earthworm Invasion ◽  
Invasive Earthworms ◽  
Invasion Impacts ◽  
Arthropod Abundance

AbstractDeclining arthropod communities have recently gained a lot of attention with climate and land-use change among the most-frequently discussed drivers. Here, we focus on a seemingly underrepresented driver of arthropod-community decline: biological invasions. For ∼12,000 years, earthworms have been absent from wide parts of northern North America, but they have been re-introduced with dramatic consequences. Most studies investigating earthworm-invasion impacts focus on the belowground world, resulting in limited knowledge on aboveground-community changes. We present observational data on earthworm, plant, and aboveground-arthropod communities in 60 plots, distributed across areas with increasing invasion status (low, medium, high) in a Canadian forest. We analyzed how earthworm-invasion status and biomass impact aboveground arthropod community abundance, biomass, and species richness, and how earthworm impacts cascade across trophic levels. We sampled ∼13,000 arthropods, dominated by Hemiptera, Diptera, Araneae, Thysanoptera, and Hymenoptera. Total arthropod abundance, biomass, and species richness declined significantly from areas of low to those with high invasion status with reductions of 61, 27, and 18%, respectively. Structural Equation Models unraveled that earthworms directly and indirectly impact arthropods across trophic levels. We show that earthworm invasion can alter aboveground multitrophic arthropod communities and suggest that belowground invasions can be important drivers of aboveground-arthropod decline.

scholarly journals Do Invasive Earthworms Affect the Functional Traits of Native Plants?

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lise Thouvenot ◽  
Olga Ferlian ◽  
Rémy Beugnon ◽  
Tom Künne ◽  
Alfred Lochner ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Functional Groups ◽  
Plant Community ◽  
Functional Traits ◽  
North American ◽  
Native Plants ◽  
Plant Biomass ◽  
Grass Species ◽  
Earthworm Invasion ◽  
Invasive Earthworms ◽  
Community Changes

As ecosystem engineers, invasive earthworms are one of the main drivers of plant community changes in North American forests previously devoid of earthworms. One explanation for these community changes is the effects of earthworms on the reproduction, recruitment, and development of plant species. However, few studies have investigated functional trait responses of native plants to earthworm invasion to explain the mechanisms underlying community changes. In a mesocosm (Ecotron) experiment, we set up a plant community composed of two herb and two grass species commonly found in northern North American forests under two earthworm treatments (presence vs. absence). We measured earthworm effects on above- and belowground plant biomass and functional traits after 3 months of experiment. Our results showed that earthworm presence did not significantly affect plant community biomass and cover. Furthermore, only four out of the fifteen above- and belowground traits measured were affected by earthworm presence. While some traits, such as the production of ramets, the carbon and nitrogen content of leaves, responded similarly between and within functional groups in the presence or absence of earthworms, we observed opposite responses for other traits, such as height, specific leaf area, and root length within some functional groups in the presence of earthworms. Plant trait responses were thus species-specific, although the two grass species showed a more pronounced response to earthworm presence with changes in their leaf traits than herb species. Overall, earthworms affected some functional traits related to resource uptake abilities of plants and thus could change plant competition outcomes over time, which could be an explanation of plant community changes observed in invaded ecosystems.

scholarly journals Oil palm and rubber expansion facilitates earthworm invasion in Indonesia

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anton Potapov ◽  
Ina Schaefer ◽  
Malte Jochum ◽  
Rahayu Widyastuti ◽  
Nico Eisenhauer ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Oil Palm ◽  
Human Activities ◽  
Negative Effects ◽  
Soil Biodiversity ◽  
Deforestation Rate ◽  
Beneficial Effects ◽  
Earthworm Invasion ◽  
Invasive Earthworms ◽  
Native Soil ◽  
Density And Biomass

AbstractDeforestation, plantation expansion and other human activities in tropical ecosystems are often associated with biological invasions. These processes have been studied for above-ground organisms, but associated changes below the ground have received little attention. We surveyed rainforest and plantation systems in Jambi province, Sumatra, Indonesia, to investigate effects of land-use change on the diversity and abundance of earthworms—a major group of soil-ecosystem engineers that often is associated with human activities. Density and biomass of earthworms increased 4—30-fold in oil palm and rubber monoculture plantations compared to rainforest. Despite much higher abundance, earthworm communities in plantations were less diverse and dominated by the peregrine morphospecies Pontoscolex corethrurus, often recorded as invasive. Considering the high deforestation rate in Indonesia, invasive earthworms are expected to dominate soil communities across the region in the near future, in lieu of native soil biodiversity. Ecologically-friendly management approaches, increasing structural habitat complexity and plant diversity, may foster beneficial effects of invasive earthworms on plant growth while mitigating negative effects on below-ground biodiversity and the functioning of the native soil animal community.

scholarly journals Invasive Earthworms Alter Forest Soil Microbiomes and Nitrogen Cycling

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jeonghwan Jang ◽  
Xianyi Xiong ◽  
Chang Liu ◽  
Kyungsoo Yoo ◽  
Satoshi Ishii
Keyword(s):  
Nitrogen Cycling ◽  
Soil Depth ◽  
Amplicon Sequencing ◽  
Biological Properties ◽  
Northern Hardwood Forests ◽  
Shotgun Metagenomics ◽  
Earthworm Invasion ◽  
Invasive Earthworms ◽  
Exotic Earthworms ◽  
Different Depths

AbstractNorthern hardwood forests in formerly glaciated areas had been free of earthworms until exotic European earthworms were introduced by human activities. The invasion of exotic earthworms is known to dramatically alter soil physical, geochemical, and biological properties, but its impacts on soil microbiomes are still unclear. Here we show that the invasive earthworms alter soil microbiomes and ecosystem functioning, especially for nitrogen cycling. We collected soil samples at different depths from three sites across an active earthworm invasion chronosequence in a hardwood forest in Minnesota, USA. We analyzed the structures and the functional potentials of the soil microbiomes by using amplicon sequencing, high-throughput nitrogen cycle gene quantification (NiCE chip), and shotgun metagenomics. Both the levels of earthworm invasion and soil depth influenced the microbiome structures. In the most recently and minimally invaded soils, Nitrososphaera and Nitrospira as well as the genes related to nitrification were more abundant than in the heavily invaded soils. By contrast, genes related to denitrification and nitrogen fixation were more abundant in the heavily invaded than the minimally invaded soils. Our results suggest that the N cycling in forest soils is mostly nitrification driven before earthworm invasion, whereas it becomes denitrification driven after earthworm invasion.

scholarly journals Contrasting protist communities (Cercozoa: Rhizaria) in pristine and earthworm-invaded North American deciduous forests

2022 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kenneth Dumack ◽  
Olga Ferlian ◽  
Deisy Morselli Gysi ◽  
Florine Degrune ◽  
Robin-Tobias Jauss ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Soil Structure ◽  
Forest Health ◽  
Soil Microbial Diversity ◽  
Soil Microbial ◽  
Earthworm Invasion ◽  
Operational Taxonomic Units ◽  
Microbial Food Webs ◽  
Invasive Earthworms ◽  
European Settlement ◽  
Soil Temperatures

AbstractEarthworms are considered ecosystem engineers due to their fundamental impact on soil structure, soil processes and on other soil biota. An invasion of non-native earthworm species has altered soils of North America since European settlement, a process currently expanding into still earthworm-free forest ecosystems due to continuous spread and increasing soil temperatures owing to climate change. Although earthworms are known to modify soil microbial diversity and activity, it is as yet unclear how eukaryote consumers in soil microbial food webs will be affected. Here, we investigated how earthworm invasion affects the diversity of Cercozoa, one of the most dominant protist taxa in soils. Although the composition of the native cercozoan community clearly shifted in response to earthworm invasion, the communities of the different forests showed distinct responses. We identified 39 operational taxonomic units (OTUs) exclusively indicating earthworm invasion, hinting at an earthworm-associated community of Cercozoa. In particular, Woronina pythii, a hyper-parasite of plant-parasitic Oomycota in American forests, increased strongly in the presence of invasive earthworms, indicating an influence of invasive earthworms on oomycete communities and potentially on forest health, which requires further research.

MASS BALANCE IN LATTICE BOLTZMANN METHOD WITH DIRICHLET VELOCITY BOUNDARY CONDITION

2017 ◽  
Vol 48 (9) ◽  
pp. 811-826
Author(s):  
Zheng Li ◽  
Mo Yang ◽  
Ya-Ling He ◽  
Yuwen Zhang
Keyword(s):  
Boundary Condition ◽  
Lattice Boltzmann Method ◽  
Mass Balance ◽  
Lattice Boltzmann ◽  
Boltzmann Method

Evaluation of Nutrients Mass Balance on the Weirs in the Mid-lower Nakdong River Basin

2020 ◽  
Vol 42 (5) ◽  
pp. 406-414
Author(s):  
Seoung-Muk Park ◽  
Yong-Eun Joo ◽  
Byung-Hyun Moon ◽  
Byung-Dae Lee ◽  
Shun-Hwa Lee
Keyword(s):  
Mass Balance ◽  
River Basin ◽  
Nakdong River ◽  
Nakdong River Basin

Interaction between ground water and surface water in the northern Everglades and relation to water budget and mercury cycling; study methods and appendixes

2000 ◽  
Author(s):  
Judson W. Harvey ◽  
S.L. Krupa ◽  
C.J. Gefvert ◽  
Jungyill Choi ◽  
R.H. Mooney ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Surface Water ◽  
Ground Water ◽  
Water Budget ◽  
Mercury Cycling ◽  
Study Methods
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