Silva Nova – Restoring soil biology and soil functions to gain multiple benefits in new forests
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Silva Nova – Restoring soil biology and soil functions to gain multiple benefits in new forests. / Gundersen, Per; Bezemer, T. Martijn; Kepfer Rojas, Sebastian; Tedersoo, Leho; Vesterdal, Lars; Schmidt, Inger Kappel.
In: Research Ideas and Outcomes, Vol. 9, e101455, 2023.Research output: Contribution to journal › Journal article › Research › peer-review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - Silva Nova – Restoring soil biology and soil functions to gain multiple benefits in new forests
AU - Gundersen, Per
AU - Bezemer, T. Martijn
AU - Kepfer Rojas, Sebastian
AU - Tedersoo, Leho
AU - Vesterdal, Lars
AU - Schmidt, Inger Kappel
PY - 2023
Y1 - 2023
N2 - Afforestation is proposed as one of the most effective climate solutions for carbon sequestration. As a majority of threatened species are linked to forests, afforestation can also contribute to mitigate the biodiversity crisis. There is however a caveat: the agricultural legacy (high nutrient availability, altered soil biota structure and function) of new forests constrains the development of forest-adapted species, affects tree growth and stability, and delays environmental benefits from afforestation.We hypothesize that inoculation of former arable land with soil (including microbiome, fauna and seeds/rhizomes of understory vegetation) from old forests along with targeted tree species mixtures will improve productivity and more rapidly restore forest-adapted communities. This will ultimately result in diverse, stable and resilient multifunctional forests.We will test this hypothesis and develop applied inoculation methods by: i) exploring soil biota and benchmarking biodiversity in existing afforestation research Chronosequence platforms (chronosequences and sites with increasing distance to other forests); ii) conducting inoculation experiments in mesocosms to measure seedling performance and, above- and belowground linkages; iii) establishing field-scale inoculation experiments in new and existing afforestations to test short- and long-term inoculation success on forest productivity, biodiversity and soil functioning at the ecosystem scale; iv) incorporating the landscape context into guidelines and tools for spatially explicit prioritization of areas for assisted dispersal.The aims are to resolve barriers for successful restoration and develop landscape-scale afforestation strategies that optimize productivity and biodiversity for the planning and implementation of green infrastructure; and produce basic knowledge on the tree, understory vegetation, soil fauna and microbiome nexus and its effect on forest productivity, biodiversity and soil functions (N-retention, C-sequestration, methane uptake)
AB - Afforestation is proposed as one of the most effective climate solutions for carbon sequestration. As a majority of threatened species are linked to forests, afforestation can also contribute to mitigate the biodiversity crisis. There is however a caveat: the agricultural legacy (high nutrient availability, altered soil biota structure and function) of new forests constrains the development of forest-adapted species, affects tree growth and stability, and delays environmental benefits from afforestation.We hypothesize that inoculation of former arable land with soil (including microbiome, fauna and seeds/rhizomes of understory vegetation) from old forests along with targeted tree species mixtures will improve productivity and more rapidly restore forest-adapted communities. This will ultimately result in diverse, stable and resilient multifunctional forests.We will test this hypothesis and develop applied inoculation methods by: i) exploring soil biota and benchmarking biodiversity in existing afforestation research Chronosequence platforms (chronosequences and sites with increasing distance to other forests); ii) conducting inoculation experiments in mesocosms to measure seedling performance and, above- and belowground linkages; iii) establishing field-scale inoculation experiments in new and existing afforestations to test short- and long-term inoculation success on forest productivity, biodiversity and soil functioning at the ecosystem scale; iv) incorporating the landscape context into guidelines and tools for spatially explicit prioritization of areas for assisted dispersal.The aims are to resolve barriers for successful restoration and develop landscape-scale afforestation strategies that optimize productivity and biodiversity for the planning and implementation of green infrastructure; and produce basic knowledge on the tree, understory vegetation, soil fauna and microbiome nexus and its effect on forest productivity, biodiversity and soil functions (N-retention, C-sequestration, methane uptake)
U2 - 10.3897/rio.9.e101455
DO - 10.3897/rio.9.e101455
M3 - Journal article
VL - 9
JO - Research Ideas and Outcomes
JF - Research Ideas and Outcomes
SN - 2367-7163
M1 - e101455
ER -
ID: 337781564