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Project properties |
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| Title | Stimulating earthworm populations in horticulture – is that feasible? |
| Group | Soil Biology |
| Project type | thesis |
| Credits | 24-39 |
| Supervisor(s) | Ron de Goede |
| Examiner(s) | Prof.dr. Rachel Creamer |
| Contact info | ron.degoede@wur.nl |
| Begin date | 2018/09/01 |
| End date | |
| Description | Earthworms are important ecosystem engineers. They contribute to soil fertility, soil structure formation, and water cycling. Due to the often very intensive soil management in horticultural soils earthworm population density is often low and restricted to a few species, mainly endogeic species. Especially anecic and also epigeic species are rare, but could potentially play an important contribution to soil functioning, also in horticultural soils. You will do research in a local horticultural field to study effects of tillage and crop residue treatments on earthworm populations.
The research is part of a research program funded by the province of Gelderland in which we aim to demonstrate the importance of earthworms for agriculture. |
| Used skills | Literature review, writing proposal and thesis, sampling and field experiments, biological and chemical laboratory work, data analysis
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| Requirements | Basic knowledge of and affinity with soil chemistry
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