BISC 204 Lecture Notes - Lecture 22: Photic Zone, Upwelling, Soil Fertility
8 Dec 2016
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Document Summary
Human alterations can affect nutrient cycling and retention in terrestrial ecosystems. Tropical forest agriculture have nutrients in the living biomass and not the soil so they can last for about a decade. In these environments, 20% of total biomass is in detritus, while in the tropics, it is 1-2% More erosion so the amount of detritus is reduced. The ecosystem can become leaky (net loss of n), which has implications for aquatic ecosystems that are downstream. Vegetation and soil fertility are involved in intricate feedback cycles, nutrient rich soils support productive, lush vegetation communities. However, if plants are removed from ecosystems like this (for example due to human alterations), the nutrients can be rapidly lost from the ecosystem via leaching. Organic matter produced through the primary production from plants forms the organic components of soils. Plants also retain nutrients within the soils of ecosystems. These processes have important effects on the development of nutrients in soils.
