Summary
This study examined soil microbial communities in 40 samples from 10 urban allotment gardens in Santiago de Compostela, Spain, using DNA sequencing and network analysis. Despite expectations that anthropogenic activity would reduce microbial diversity, fungal and bacterial richness were comparable to less disturbed urban soils; however, communities showed a significantly more random assembly pattern and fragmented network structure indicative of anthropogenic homogenisation. The findings suggest that intensive management in urban allotments disrupts microbial co-occurrence networks and ecological assembly processes, with potential implications for soil health and ecosystem function.
Regional applicability
The study was conducted in Spain rather than the United Kingdom, though the findings are likely transferable to UK urban agriculture given similar climate zones and anthropogenic pressures. UK urban allotment and community garden systems would benefit from analogous microbial surveys to assess whether comparable randomisation of soil communities occurs under similar management intensities.
Key measures
Fungal and bacterial richness, community composition, tNST (taxonomic null deviation), pseudo-R² from neutral community models, network module size and connectivity
Outcomes reported
The study characterised fungal and bacterial community composition and diversity in urban allotment garden soils using ITS/16S marker gene sequencing and network analysis. It assessed whether microbial communities followed deterministic or random assembly patterns compared to other urban land-use categories.
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