SOIL ORGANISM DIVERSITY AND FUNCTIONS IN PLASTIC SHED AND OPEN FIELD SOILS UNDER DIFFERENT CULTIVATION METHODS

The aim of this study was to investigate the influence of four different cropping management practices in plastic shed soils and open-field soils under organic cultivation or conventional cultivation on soil biodiversity and functions. Soils under plastic sheds and open-field were sampled in Beijing, China, in areas where organic cultivation had been conducted for 5 years and conventional cultivation had also been employed. The results showed that plastic shed production resulted in lower soil bacterial richness and diversity than open-field but higher soil mesofaunal Shannon diversity and Pielou's species evenness indexes. Plastic shed production decreased soil urease and phosphate activities compared to open-field under conventional cultivation. Organic cultivation resulted in higher soil urease, phosphatase and catalase activities than conventional cultivation except for soil urease activity in open soil. Plastic shed soils exhibited significantly higher soil electric conductivity (EC) and NO3-N contents than open-field soils only under conventional cultivation. By contrast, organic cultivation decreased soil EC and nitrate contents compared to conventional cultivation in plastic shed soils. Organic cultivation resulted in higher soil bacterial OTU, Shannon diversity, Chaol and ACE indexes than conventional cultivation, but significant differences were observed in the open-field soils.