Basic description of what you find in the soil food web. That is, the life you will find under the soil that you walk on everyday, whether it is hidden under your house, apartment or office, soil is underneath you, everywhere, even where there is water. The components, fungi, nematodes ect., support the life under the earth, and the life over the earth, roots and plants, and even the birds and other animals, that we as the human race depend on. Round-up and other chemical fertilizers, herbicide and pesticide, kills not only weeds, but also the soil food web’s lively components, that we cannot live without.
Here you got a quick overview on how much life there is in a healthy soil food web. Impressive, eh? In weight of mass, there is 7 times more weight under the earth, than the total weight of all humans alive.
Without all this life that you have seen some drawings off above, no tree or plant can grow. And then we are going to hit catastrophic consequences, because then there is no food anymore.
One of the fine tasks of the many small organisms underneath our feet, is to make sure that water and air can flow under the soil. This helps plant and trees to breath and to take in water.
And as you can see below, this helps the trees and plants to grow, and via evapotranspiration, clouds form and rain and water keeps on cycling and maintains life on earth.
Now here you see how important trees are for our fresh air. Trees and plants breathe the CO^2 and transforms it into valuable nutrition. With the help of trees and plants we are able to have fresh air and decrease global warming, not only because of the shade they provide but also because they simple eat and use the CO^2. So as complimentary to cutting CO^2 emissions, we need to build forests everywhere.
We started to look at the life under the earth. That is so strong and necessary for life on earth, but at the same time to fragile, and critical to our survival. We looked at the importance of the work that they do under the soil. We looked at the important roles of trees and plants, that the soil food web support.
Now lets zoom out and look at the picture below, from NASA, anno 2013. This picture shows the vastly spreading of deserts on our planet. Approximately 1/3 of our home is now a desert, inhabitable for most life. This means 1/3 of our homes hydrological function is gone, places without almost any water. The soil food web has been destroyed by human action. Ecological systems do not degrade by themselves, it is human implied manipulation of the landscape that has brought our earth to this situation. It is only human action that can reverse it, and it can be even more beautiful than before, and we can have great fun while we do it.
On this page you have taken in some information that is necessary to understand, if you want to know what state our planet, our home, finds itself in.
You have gotten information on what life that exists under the earth. This possible made you understand why organic food, and why not poisoning our soils is so important, not just for the small life underneath our feet, but also how it effects birds, animals, us and other mammals.
You have learned about hydrological cycles. The most important resource on this planet. Water. How do we maintain it, and how to we keep it fresh and clean, those answer you will get closer to on this page.
To know more about the Soil Food Web – read the following book;
http://teamingwithmicrobes.com/home/
To know more about the hydrological cycles and the importance of functioning ecological systems – watch the following video;
To know more about desertification and the catastrophic consequences we will face if we dont do something on a collective level – watch the following video;
Restoring Large Scaled Damaged Ecological Systems 