CHANGES IN LEAF LITTER WHEN PLACED ON THE SURFACE OF SOILS WITH CONTRASTING HUMUS TYPES

Abstract

Summary The dry‐weight losses of samples of oak and ash litter, enclosed in nylon hairnets and placed on two sites with contrasting humus forms, a mull and a moder, have been followed for a period of 14 months. Sub‐samples of the same oak litter disappear at similar rates on the two sites. Sub‐samples of the same ash litter disappear at different rates on the two sites, but always more quickly than oak litter. On the mull site the loss of whole ash leaflets as well as fragments of leaflets is considerable whereas oak leaves on both sites and ash leaflets on the moder site disappear mainly as small fragments. For both oak and ash litter the results from the mull site are more variable than those from the moder site, suggesting that there are differences in the heterotrophic activity on the two sites.