Life Under Your Feet: Measuring Soil Invertebrate Diversity

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This Experiment, students collect soil samples to test hypotheses about the diversity of invertebrates in soil in different places or under different conditions. Students generate their own hypotheses, and the activity is adaptable to available local conditions, such as different forest types, different stages of succession, or areas with and without impacts such as logging or wind damage. Students sample invertebrates using Berlese-Tullgren funnels and compare the abundance and diversity (using diversity indices) of different sample types.

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Primary or BEN resource type	Laboratory exercise
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Format	html
Ecological Core Concept	Ecosystems -- Decomposition Ecosystems Communities -- Species composition, abundance, and diversity Communities
Drought & Water-Ecosystem Services Collection	Off
Conservation Targets Under Global Change Collection	Off
Big Data Collection	Off
Editor's Choice	No
Audience	Undergraduate upper division 15-16 Undergraduate lower division 13-14
Pedagogical Use Description	This Experiment provides the general framework for a soil diversity lab and allows the instructor or students to design the specific hypothesis and experimental design. It can be used as is to give students an opportunity to design their own experiment in groups or as a class, or the instructor can specify where students sample or what hypothesis is tested. The experiment is an adaptable opportunity to teach students about some of the factors influencing soil diversity and give them some experience designing their own experiment, all within the specific context of a local ecosystem.
Keywords	invertebrate; soil; diversity; richness; diversity index; Berlese; Tullgren; hypothesis; experiment; insect; TIEE; pedagogy; inquiry based
Life science discipline (subject)	Ecology
Primary Author Controlled Name	Richard Boyce
Primary Author Affiliation	Northern Kentucky University, Dept. of Biological Sciences
Primary Author email	boycer@nku.edu
Rights	Copyright 2005 by Richard L. Boyce and the Ecological Society of America.
Resource Editor	Unknown
Reviewer A	Unknown
Reviewer B	Unknown
Date Of Record Submission	2007-11-01

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