Briefing on the Soil Survey in Shennongjia National Park

This special survey, carried out in accordance with the requirements of national, departmental and local technical norms and standards, has adopted the latest international survey and monitoring technology and has aimed to investigate and assess the soil type and the soil biology within areas of Shennongjia National Park (including some areas in Badong County, Xingshan County, Zhushan County and Zhuxi County in Hubei Province, as well as some surrounding areas). To be specific, the main objectives of this survey include the comprehensive investigation of the soil type to get a full picture of the main soil types in Shennongjia, for the establishment of Shennongjia’s soil distribution database; the comprehensive investigation of soil microorganisms and soil animal resources, for the assessment of soil microorganisms in different ecosystems and of the animal diversity and distribution in Shennongjia, as well as for the understanding of the dominant, key soil microflora and their relationships with various environmental elements in those areas; the ascertainment of the main species and the distribution of their habitat concerning those soil animals; the establishment of the complete inventory of soil animal species and microbial species; and the standardized production and digitization of a batch of soil specimen.

Due to the complex terrain and the unpredictable weather in this region, the whole team sometimes found themselves in a worse predicament like being caught in the downpour or landslide, which greatly added to the difficulty of the task. Nevertheless, all the team members were collaborating actively and assisting each other to successfully complete the whole task.

Shennongjia National Park and staff from the Hubei Academy of Forestry provided considerable support for this field survey. What is more, Liu Feng and Jiang Qinghu, teachers from Wuhan Botanical Garden of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, also offered invaluable assistance when conducting the preliminary work. We are grateful for their tremendous support and we would like to extend our heartfelt thanks to them! (By the Survey Team)