ENVS200 Chapter Notes - Chapter 2: Plant Litter, Humus, Parent Material
Document Summary
Chapter 2 part 2, soil: foundation of terrestrial biomes. Soil structure results from the long-term interaction of climate, organisms, topography, and parent mineral material. It is fair to say that there are few topics that many biology students find less interesting than soils. Yes, some ecologists study those things, and many important questions have been answered. However, none of those things would exist without soil. Soil is a complex mixture of living and nonliving material upon which most terrestrial life depends. In addition to its importance in sustaining the communities and ecosystems that we can easily see, soils themselves are complex ecological systems. The amount of organic material, living and dead, found in soil is not trivial. In fact, it is estimated that there is more organic carbon stored below ground than above ground (schimel 1995), leading to the logical conclusion that the terrestrial world is brown and black, not green (wall et al.
