Grassland Soil Invertebrates

This data is from an independent proposal that investigated the diversity of soil invertebrates found in grasslands on the NECC Haverhill campus. Soil moisture and invertebrate variety was the focus of this proposal. It was thought that closer to the marsh the grassland would have moister soil and more invertebrates than further up the hill. We compared the effects that the soil moisture and the ground cover around the 18 samples that were taken. In this investigation, we set up two transects that would cover most all plant species in the grasslands. Each transect had 9 soil samples taken, the transects started at the marsh in the grassland and continued uphill. Plant samples were collected and identified, ground cover percentage and density of each plant was also taken into account for each area surrounding the soil samples. Every sample of soil was sifted through and all invertebrates were collected, identified and quantified. Water content was also measured using a small portion of each sample, the moist samples were weighed and then left to dry to be weighed again.