Book
The world beneath our feet: the hidden life of soil and why it matters to us all
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To appreciate the wonders of the world around us, we're often told to look up. But what if we need to look down instead? Everything that happens below ground sustains all life above it - yet we rarely think about this mysterious, dark underland. In this work, soil ecologist Frank Ashwood scratches the surface and takes us on an eye-opening safari through this precious ecosystem, from the ancient forests of New Zealand to the vast black soil deposits of the US and China. Every layer of the pedosphere is a world of its own, each more alien than the last as we travel deeper into the Earth. The ground beneath our feet hums with a staggering abundance of winding roots, interconnecting fungal networks, wriggling creatures and mind-blowing microbial life. This hidden ecosystem is the single most biodiverse habitat on the planet.
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