Soil Macrofauna as Indicator of Environmental Recovery in a Mining Area

ABSTRACT This work aimed to characterize the composition of the soil macrofauna in non-mined and mined areas recovered with native vegetation, Eucalyptus dunnii Maiden and Acacia mearnsii De Wild. plantations, in a coal mine. Five areas were evaluated, namely, three non-mined areas and two mined and recovered areas. Six soil samples per area were collected using a 10x10 cm circular probe, every month during one year. Defragmentation of the soil and removal of specimens was carried out in a laboratory. A total of 3,195 specimens from 11 taxa were collected. The most abundant groups were Hymenoptera, Isoptera and Coleoptera. There were significant correlations (p<0.05) between the total abundance of Isoptera and Coleoptera with some meteorological variables. The recovery process of the mined areas with black-wattle and eucalyptus plantations proved to be efficient because there was similarity of macrofauna groups between the non-mined, mined and native vegetation areas.