How reclamation type and age influence the abundance of earthworms in anthropogenic soils

In this study we determined the effects of reclamation type and age on earthworm communities. We focused on forestry and agricultural reclaimed territories in northwest Czech Republic that were recently affected by opencast brown coal mining. We were interested in both the numbers and the biomass of obtained earthworms. The results showed that there was a significant difference between numbers of earthworms in the statistical model with spoil bank age and reclamation type interaction and those in non-interaction statistical models. With regards to the rapid development of earthworm communities, forestry reclamation is more suitable for earthworm communities than agricultural reclamation. However, we can assume that differences between methods of reclamation on the oldest spoils are becoming less evident, and the numbers of individuals become comparable.