Summary
Why is assessing forest soil condition and health important?
Soils underpin forest ecosystems by storing carbon, recycling nutrients, regulating water, and are a reservoir of biodiversity. Forest soils differ fundamentally from agricultural soils and show high spatial variability, meaning they respond differently to management, climate change, and disturbance. Assessing soil condition and health is essential to understand how forests contribute to climate regulation, biodiversity conservation, and ecosystem services, and to detect change over time. Robust soil data are also critical for national natural capital accounting and evidence‑based policy decisions.
How are we doing this?
Soil condition is assessed through the EU ICP Forest, BioSoil monitoring network and National Forest Inventory (NFI), using harmonised national and international protocols. The approach combines intensive field surveys and long‑term monitoring to measure soil chemical, physical, and biological indicators across representative forest types and soil types. Sampling includes soils to 1m depth, organic layers, carbon and nutrient stocks, soil structure, and soil biodiversity (bacteria, fungi, mesofauna, earthworms and nematodes), alongside tree fine roots and above‑ground forest structure and deadwood. Data are analysed at plot, regional, and national scales, with feasibility and gap analyses guiding network expansion and improved coverage.
What will we learn?
This work will establish a baseline assessment of soil biodiversity measurements and build on the existing BioSoil data for chemical and physical soil parameters. These datasets will support measurement of forest soil condition across England, enabling detection of change in soil health, carbon storage, biodiversity, and ecosystem function. It will improve understanding of soil food webs and how soil properties and functions link to ecosystem services such as carbon sequestration, nutrient cycling and biodiversity. The analyses will support the development of soil health indicators, thresholds, and functional typologies, and allow scaling from sites to national assessments. Ultimately, this will strengthen NCEA reporting by quantifying soil natural capital stocks, changes, and ecosystem service flows under forest management and woodland creation.
Research Objectives
England requires robust, consistent evidence on woodland soil condition to support natural capital assessment and sustainable forest management. The national BioSoil monitoring network addresses this by combining new biodiversity data with long-term soil biogeochemical monitoring.
This project’s core aims are:
- Expand the BioSoil forest soil monitoring network
Expand the harmonised soil surveys from 67 BioSoil sites (from the original baseline 2005) to ~150 plots by 2027, ensuring representative coverage across soils, forest types, climate, nitrogen deposition, and NCEA regions across England. Evaluate soil changes (chemical and physical) on 67 BioSoil plots between baseline in 2005 and resurvey of these plots under NCEA (2022-2024) - Build on soil biodiversity monitoring at the BioSoil network
Build harmonised forest soil biodiversity monitoring on ~150 BioSoil plots in England by 2027, ensuring representative coverage across soils, forest types, climate, nitrogen deposition, and NCEA regions, and delivering a robust, comparable baseline for soil biodiversity aligned with survey in other land uses by NE England Ecosystem Survey - Develop soil health indicators
Analyse integrated soil data to link chemical, physical and biological properties with ecosystem functions and define soil health indicators and thresholds, aligned with NE England Ecosystem Survey and JNCC frameworks and supported by collaboration with Kew - Implement scalable soil monitoring
Design a simplified field protocol for wider NFI use, complementing intensive BioSoil surveys, extending coverage, and reducing uncertainty in national soil assessments - Quantify soil ecosystem services
Assess soil natural capital and ecosystem service delivery, including trade-offs, synergies, and valuation approaches, to inform NCEA tools and decision-making.
Complementary work:
- Review of soil food webs
A review of soil food webs for European temperate forests to understand existing gaps for the development of indicators and the assessment of soil health in forests, and how the NCEA Soil Condition & Soil Health data can be analysed to fill some of those gaps.
Latest Update
We have recently published our first batch of Analysis Ready Data (ARD) for samples collected during 2022-24. The dataset contains comprehensive soil chemical, physical and biological indicators collected as part of the NFI+ (National Forest Inventory Plus) programme from the BioSoil forest soil and biodiversity monitoring network. The dataset covers forest soil sampling sites across Great Britain and provides baseline and monitoring data on soil condition and health in forest ecosystems.
Further releases of ARD will be available in the future alongside analysis and reports on soil carbon and nutrient changes in forest soils, soil biodiversity in forest soils and forest soil health indicators so watch this space.
Our Involvement
Forest Research is leading this work package, in collaboration with our funding body Defra and our NCEA partners RBG Kew, JNCC and Natural England.
Funders
- Funded by the UK Government through Defra’s Natural Capital and Ecosystem Assessment programme (NCEA)
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