The purpose of this study is to investigate the response of the soil mesofauna and ground-dwelling arthropods to vegetation structure and composition in a mountain pasture. The pasture mainly comprised five types of plant communities; Agrostis alba - Phleum pratense community, Poa pratensis community, Festuca ovina community, Rumex acetosella community, and the shrub assemblage comprised Spiraea miyabei-Spiraea salicifolia community. Soil chemical properties including the pH, EC and nutrient levels were influenced by plant communities. Plant-specific responses were observed for bacteria-feeding and plant-feeding soil nematodes. Collembola and Oribatida having the same feeding habit were influenced differently by plants. nMDS showed that the community of ground-dwelling arthropods were separated by vegetation types. Species numbers of arthropods were different among different plant communities. Our results indicate that vegetation structure and composition can influence both abundance of diversity of terrestrial fauna.

This study investigated the composition and distribution of the soil microarthropods community in plantations of the Korean pine(Pinus Koraiensis SIEB. et ZUCC, the sudong area, Namyangju-gun, Korea) , which had been planted in different years. The soil samples intended to collect soil animals were taken monthly from June 1988 to July 1989. The composition of soil microarthropods community included Arachnida, Chilopoda, Insecta, Collembola, Diplopoda, Crustacea, and Symphyla. The Acarina were composed of 82.4% of Cryptostigmata, 8.0% of Mesostigmata, 7.9% of nymphs, and 1.7% of others. The Insecta included six orders including Hymenoptera(65.8%) and Diptera(13.9%). Population densities increased from when the plantations were first established until the planting were 25 years old, after which they declined. Population densities of the soil microarthropods were highest in July and lowest in January. The Collembola/Acarina ratio is 0.16 overall, and was highest in January and lowest in August.