WHAT THE EVIDENCE SAYS
Thirty Transylvanian wood pastures were sampled at 1, 3, 7 and 24 m from single oaks. While soil conditions and some functional-group proportions varied, total earthworm abundance was not significantly related to distance (p=0.32); several group-level patterns weakened after multiple-test correction.
WHY IT MATTERS / OUR READ
Soil heterogeneity beneath retained trees should not be equated with automatically more soil fauna. Functional guilds and uncertainty matter alongside totals.
CAVEATS / UNCERTAINTY
Observational tree-distance comparisons; study's adjusted tests limited strength of inferences about specific earthworm guilds.
SOURCE
Bhattarai et al. · Agroforestry Systems (online 3 Nov 2026)
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