TY - CHAP TI - Sampling Methods for Soil and Litter Fauna AU - González, Grizelle AU - Barberena-Arias, Maria Fernanda AU - Huang, Wei AU - Ospina-Sánchez, Claudia M. T2 - Measuring Arthropod Biodiversity: A Handbook of Sampling Methods A2 - Santos, Jean Carlos A2 - Fernandes, Geraldo Wilson AB - The soil is an important resource for several ecosystem and biosphere processes. Yet, soil biology is challenged with the identification of many and diverse species and to understand the specific role organisms play, how they are organized, and how they respond to changing environmental conditions. Within this context, there is no universal tool or method that can be applied to a comprehensive study of all the soil and litter fauna that can be found across all soil types and environmental conditions around the globe. Thus, the type of sampling system used for any soil investigation must be carefully planned as an integral part of the study. In this chapter, we review numerous techniques and approaches to evaluate and quantify the influences of soil and litter fauna and provide methodological considerations for ecological studies of soil fauna with emphasis on the study of the decomposition process. The study of soil ecology and health remains a relevant field of research. We hope this review of methodologies for the study of soil and litter fauna will help elucidate the most appropriate technique to use based on resources at hand, organism of interest, and habitat characteristics. CY - Cham DA - 2021/// PY - 2021 DP - Springer Link SP - 495 EP - 522 LA - en PB - Springer International Publishing SN - 978-3-030-53226-0 UR - https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-53226-0_19 Y2 - 2021/09/09/17:47:16 KW - Belowground communities KW - Litter KW - Litterbags KW - Microarthropods KW - Sampling methods KW - Soil biology KW - Soil fauna KW - Soils ER -