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Forecasting land management and extreme weather effects on earthworm populations, soil function and ecosystem services

预测土地管理和极端天气对蚯蚓种群、土壤功能和生态系统服务的影响

基本信息

批准号：
NE/N019504/1
负责人：
Alice Johnston
金额：
$ 31.15万
依托单位：
University of Reading
依托单位国家：
英国
项目类别：
Fellowship
财政年份：
2016
资助国家：
英国
起止时间：
2016 至无数据
项目状态：
已结题

来源：
https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=NE%2FN019504%2F1
关键词：
Forecasting land management extreme weather

项目摘要

Soils form the basic substrate for terrestrial life. They benefit the human population by supporting the production of food, fuel and fiber and regulating the climate, disease and water resources by facilitating essential services such as soil formation and nutrient cycling. Crucial for an exponentially growing human population are the foundations that soils provide for agriculture.The activities of ecosystem engineers are important to the soil functions that underpin the provision of ecosystem services. Earthworms act as ecosystem engineers in soils both directly through digestion and burrowing activities and indirectly by encouraging other beneficial soil organisms. Management practices which optimise soil environmental conditions (e.g. soil organic carbon (SOM) and soil moisture) also stimulate earthworm biomass production. In turn the effects of earthworm activity on soil aggregate stability, nutrient cycling and soil carbon dynamics improve crop yields.Although changes in land management may increase the abundance of soil organisms, these effects depend on specific combinations of management practices and environmental factors. This makes the results of experimental field studies hard to extrapolate for different scenarios, such as in extreme weather. Thus, tools are needed to better forecast how management practices affect the provision of ecosystem services through their effects on important ecosystem engineers. Existing population models of how populations will respond to anthropogenic environmental change ignore the underlying mechanisms. Many focus only on the level of populations or individuals, rather than representing the processes which link both levels of biological organisation. Mechanistic models are needed that capture key biological, physiological and ecological mechanisms underpinning system functioning. Such models will have much better predictive power.In this proposal I show how I will develop and validate mechanistic models of earthworms which deliver important soil functions in a range of habitats. Once the models have demonstrated that they realistically capture earthworm population dynamics in the field, they will be applied to numerous agricultural scenarios, with different combinations of soil and weather conditions, crop management practices (e.g. tillage) and extreme weather (flood and drought) events. Model results will indicate the ecological consequences of the different agricultural systems by forecasting earthworm populations in these different scenarios. Relatively little is known about how earthworms respond to flood and drought. This proposal will identify the underpinning mechanisms by refining the mechanistic models to match new data under these extreme weather conditions. I will relate the role of earthworms as ecosystem engineers to soil functions and ecosystem services such as crop production and yield, by reviewing the relevant scientific literature. This knowledge will be used to provide new methods for quantifying the value of earthworms as ecosystem engineers which will allow better cost-benefit analysis of contrasting land management systems and promote the use of earthworms as a natural resource to land managers.

土壤是陆地生命的基本基质。它们通过支持粮食、燃料和纤维的生产，并通过促进土壤形成和养分循环等基本服务来调节气候、疾病和水资源，从而造福于人类。土壤为农业提供的基础对于呈指数级增长的人口至关重要。生态系统工程师的活动对土壤功能至关重要，土壤功能是提供生态系统服务的基础。蚯蚓在土壤中充当生态系统工程师，直接通过消化和挖掘活动，间接通过促进其他有益的土壤生物。优化土壤环境条件（如土壤有机碳（SOM）和土壤水分）的管理措施也刺激了生物量的生产。反过来，土壤微生物活动对土壤团聚体稳定性、养分循环和土壤碳动态的影响提高了作物产量，虽然土地管理的变化可能会增加土壤生物的丰度，但这些影响取决于管理做法和环境因素的具体组合。这使得实验性实地研究的结果很难外推到不同的场景，比如极端天气。因此，需要工具来更好地预测管理做法如何通过对重要的生态系统工程师的影响来影响生态系统服务的提供。现有的人口模型人口将如何应对人为环境变化忽略了潜在的机制。许多人只关注群体或个体的水平，而不是代表连接生物组织两个层次的过程。需要机制模型，捕捉关键的生物，生理和生态机制支撑系统的功能。这样的模型将有更好的预测力。在这个建议中，我将展示我如何开发和验证蚯蚓在一系列栖息地提供重要的土壤功能的机械模型。一旦这些模型证明它们真实地捕捉到田间的蝗虫种群动态，它们将被应用于多种农业情景，包括土壤和天气条件、作物管理做法（如耕作）和极端天气（洪水和干旱）事件的不同组合。模型结果将通过预测这些不同情景下的蝗虫数量来显示不同农业系统的生态后果。关于蚯蚓如何应对洪水和干旱，人们知之甚少。该提案将通过改进机制模型来确定支撑机制，以匹配这些极端天气条件下的新数据。我将通过回顾相关的科学文献，将蚯蚓作为生态系统工程师的作用与土壤功能和生态系统服务（如作物生产和产量）联系起来。这一知识将被用来提供新的方法，量化蚯蚓作为生态系统工程师的价值，这将有助于更好地对对比土地管理系统进行成本效益分析，并促进土地管理人员将蚯蚓作为自然资源加以利用。