Seeds in Soil and Worm Casts from a Neutral Grassland

Abstract

Density of germinable seeds was determined in each of 128 blocks of surface soil, each 7×7 cm, together forming a 112x56 cm rectangle, taken from a lowland, species-poor sown grassland in Devon. The turf contained only six species, but seeds of 27 species germinated from the soil. The commonest species in the turf, Festuca rubra, was absent from the seed bank. The second most frequent species in the seed bank, Coronopus didymus, was absent from the turf. Trifolium repens was common in both. The seeds of several weed species had survived in the soil for up to 10 years. Buried seeds of all the common species were significantly clumped. For species common to both, there was no evidence of significant correlation between small-scale abundance in the turf and the seed bank (...)