Soil Health Evaluation in Ecological Restoration in savannah environments - SHEER
Research project overview
The study aims to identify a suitable pedological information system through the collection of available metadata from international pedological databases as well as field samples. As a result, soil functions and health during an ecological restoration in savannah environments will be assessed. Ecological restoration will be implemented on different areas and a model will be developed to predict the suitability of plant species and their location according to all the parameters collected.
Methodology
Landscape function analysis and spatially explicit evaluation ( i.e., GIS and multivariate tools, Soil Digital Mapping and pedometry) will be used to evaluate the local effectiveness of pedological indicators. The minimum set of soil quality parameters or indicators (IQS) shall be defined using approaches such as that of the metabolic quotient (qCO2), ratio F: B or LFA, in conjunction with SDM and other predictive models.
Potential impact:
The project will provide insight into the dynamics of ecological processes and outline the best practices for monitoring soil baselines and restoring soil properties in a restoration site, not only in the studied areas, but transferable to other geographical contexts.
Team members
- Dr Marcello Di Bonito – Principal Investigator – ARES
- Dr Andrew Gichira – Co-Investigator – CER--K
- Dr Peter Njenga – Co-Investigator – Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology
- Dr Purity Gacheri – Co-Investigator – Mount Kenya University
- Dr Mauro De Feudis – Co-Investigator – University of Bologna