Earthworm monitoring in Austrian forests

Around 48% of Austria is covered by forest, making it one of the most densely forested countries in Europe. Forests are home to a wide variety of plants, fungi, birds and mammals, yet little is known about the importance of soils and their animal communities. Soils are among the most species-rich habitats, and healthy soils are crucial for resilient ecosystems that can withstand climate extremes such as heavy rainfall or drought and store carbon in the long term. In 2024, under the leadership of BOKU Zoology, Austria’s first nationwide earthworm monitoring programme was carried out in open landscapes. This identified around half of the 62 earthworm species found in Austria. The present ‘WaldRegenwürmer’ project builds on this foundation and establishes systematic monitoring of earthworm fauna in Austria’s forests. The project objectives are: - To survey earthworm diversity, abundance and biomass in different forest types across Austria. - To analyse the key factors (site, soil, management, climate) that determine the occurrence of earthworms, and to develop a tool for assessing soil health in forests. - Utilising the results by contributing to the Red List of Austrian earthworms and deriving practical recommendations for forest owners, forest managers and ecologists. In doing so, WaldRegenwürmer fulfils the criteria of Measure 10 of the Forest Fund in several respects: It is a monitoring and research project on biodiversity-related topics (funding objective 11.2.1). Through target-group-specific public outreach and awareness-raising (excursions, species profiles, webinars, school programmes, social media), the importance of healthy forest soils is communicated (funding objective 11.2.2). By deriving practical management recommendations for forest owners, the project contributes to the improvement and long-term safeguarding of valuable habitats in forests (funding area 11.2.3). The project thus strengthens the implementation of the Austrian Biodiversity Strategy 2030+ and supports European initiatives such as the EU Soil Monitoring Law.