Biological soil crust community types differ in key ecological functions

By N. Pietrasiak, J. Regus, J. Johansen, D. Lam, Joel L. Sachs, Louis S. Santiago. Soil Biology and Biochemistry, 2013

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Soil stability, nitrogen and carbon fixation were assessed for eight biological soil crust community types within a Mojave Desert wilderness site. Cyanolichen crust outperformed all other crusts in multi-functionality whereas incipient crust had the poorest performance. A finely divided classification of biological soil crust communities improves estimation of ecosystem function and strengthens the accuracy of landscape-scale assessments.

Subfields: Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics, Environmental Chemistry

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/0ad721b957db243fac30fc275112b546d70c0433