Environmental considerations are playing an increasingly important role indetermining management strategies for soil and land. Many importantenvironmental issue... » 

Environmental considerations are playing an increasingly important role indetermining management strategies for soil and land. Many importantenvironmental issues involve aspects of the biology of soil and these issuescannot be considered satisfactorily in isolation from a general understandingof soil biology as a whole. This is the second edition of a book firstpublished in 1989 and now thoroughly rewritten to focus on soil ecology andenvironmental issues. The first part of the book provides an introduction tosoils its inhabitants and their activities. The second part covers theinfluence of man on the natural cycles of soil. Topics such as acid rain andnitrogen fertilizers are considered alongside pesticides and geneticallymodified organisms. A new final chapter has been added which considers how aswe move towards the next millennium we can apply the concept of sustainabilityto issues such as global climate change and farming systems. The book isdirected at advanced undergraduate and immediate postgraduate students inenvironmental science and soil ecology with students of physical geography andearth sciences as an important secondary market. «