A new study comparing 46 field experiments in 17 countries across four continents clearly spells it out: areas in need of nature restoration benefit from soil transplantation.
A new study comparing 46 field experiments in 17 countries across four continents clearly spells it out: areas in need of nature restoration benefit from soil transplantation. The global results were collected by an international research team coordinated by Jasper Wubs from the Netherlands Institute of Ecology (NIOO-KNAW). Their findings are published today in The Journal of Applied Ecology.
From boreal grasslands to tropical forests: the gamut of nature to be restored on our planet is wide. There’s an urgent call for effective restoration methods, but what actually works? In many places, nature could do with a transplant. Not of vital organs but of soil, with healthy natural areas as donors.
It sounds almost too good to be true: you take some healthy soil including the associated soil life and plant seeds, and you ‘make a donation’ in an area where nature is degraded. Following this ‘soil transplantation’, natural life will recover at an accelerated pace, sustaine
Read more at: Netherlands Institute of Ecology
Soil transplantation projects worldwide come in all shapes and sizes, but what works and why? It is important to treat donor areas wisely and respectfully. From upper left, clockwise: 1) control-treatment comparison restoring semi-dry grassland near Munich, Germany in 2015, 20 years post-treatment. 2) soil translocation in action, triggering tropical dry forest regeneration, near Brasilia, Brazil. 3) Reference vegetation on a Quercus rotundifolia dehesa soil in Salamanca, Spain. 4) Soil receiver site preparation to restore coastal sage scrub in Orange County, southern California, USA. (Photo Credit: Wolfgang von Brackel, Maxmiller Ferreira, Ignacio Santa-Regina/Irnasa-CSIC and Megan Lulow/UCI-Nature / collage by NIOO-KNAW)
