Sonoma Mountain Institute

After the initial work in our grassland we became curious…Is there a difference in the soilfood web of native and non-native plant species? So we went ahead and took a “look see”. Jacob and I went to a local preserve containing a good population of native species in their grassland. Within this particular area the delineation is clear between the native species and where the non-native species are established. We took samples from the root zone of four plants, each plant was dominant in that particular area. (Phalaris aquatica – invasive, Hordeum brachyantherum – native, Elymus glaucus – native, and a combination area of Danthonia californica and Nassella pulchra – native).

Pepperwood Sample Spreadsheet 04.01.08

Along with this data, the monthly soilfood webs on three grassland communities are dominated by three non-native species, Phalaris aquatica, Holcus lanatus and Avena sp., Check the last post for data comparison.

Note that the two starthistle samples were taken from an area that had been treated with an unknown chemical three years previous. This year it is finally showing a little plant life…so out of curiosity I took two samples. The other, Nassella pulchra is taken next to one of the chemically treated areas as a comparison.

Within these few samples taken from the preserve and the monthly monitoring project, I am not seeing any standout data, other than the chemically treated starthistle areas being much lower in microbiology. For a follow up we are going to go back next week to take two more samples from each area for replication.