ZLV Online

Abstract

This paper summarizes the knowledge gained during a five-year survey of the microbiological properties of forest soils in the Czech Republic. This aimed to characterize undamaged forest communities with regard to species composition, vegetation zones and soil chemical reactions. The holorganic forest soil F-horizon and H-horizon and the organo-mineral horizon were the object of study and their microbial properties were given to be distinctive to the spruce or beech forest management units of the production forests. The type of the study, with regard to the management units, seems to be the only practicable way giving the useful results. Today, the set of analytic entries is sufficient to give the representative characteristic of forest stands of spruce and beech. The spruce stands are characteristic with the higher volume of carbon oxidizable (Cox) and total carbon (Ctot), and the beech stands with the higher volume of carbon of microbial biomass and the higher microbial activity. The spruce stands are typical with the higher activity of fosfomonoesterase, α-glucosidase and β-xylosidase in the some horizons, and there is the higher activity of urease, chitinase and arylsulfatase in the beech stands. The results give a snapshot of selected characteristics (levels of carbon, nitrogen, phosphorus and organic material), soil activity (basal respiration and substrate-induced respiration rates, specific growth rates and anaerobic N mineralization) and enzyme activity (urease, chitinase, fosfatase, β-glycosidase, arylsulfatese and β-xylosidase).