It’s Alive! Uncovering the Roots of Life in Forest Soils
This website combines a problem-based learning (PBL) case study with multimedia to illustrate the effects of several types of timber harvesting on soil microbial communities and their functions; developed to enhance material covered in the APBI 402 / SOIL 502 – Sustainable Soil Management course, offered at the University of British Columbia (BC), Vancouver. This educational resource provides students with multimedia web-based experience about effects of several types of forest harvesting at the Vancouver Island, BC on soil microbial groups and their functions.
The learning objectives of the educational resource are to allow students to:
- Identify major soil microbial groups,
- Describe key functional roles of soil microbes, and
- Determine if variable retention harvesting leads to healthy forest soils through the maintenance of soil organisms and their functions.
Video footage and soil data were obtained in the Silviculture Treatments for Ecosystems Management (STEMS) long-term experiment located in the Sayward Forest west of Campbell River, BC.
This educational resource was developed by a team of soil scientists, forest ecologists, graduate students, and multimedia specialists from the Virtual Soil Science Learning Resource group.
Funding for this project was provided by the UBC’s Teaching and Learning Development Fund (2011).