In September 2000, we established a reciprocal soil core transplant study at the Carpenter and Lookout sites. Our objectives have been to: (i) test the extent to which microbial parameters respond to rapid changes in vegetation and (ii) determine how quickly these responses occur. The experiment was initiated by moving soil cores from the meadow into the adjacent forest and visa-versa at each site. Control cores were either kept in the meadow or forest. To further evaluate the influence of vegetation, half of the cores were enclosed in PVC pipe to limit root ingrowth and half were placed in mesh bags to allow root ingrowth. Our first complete sampling was done in September 2001. We measured a wide range of chemical and microbial properties in soils sampled from these points.
Carpenter meadow view
Lookout meadow view