Abstract To date, the field of ecological stoichiometry has focused mainly on macro-elements in aquatic systems. We investigated terrestrial systems and included micro-elements in the study to assess the elemental transfer in a detritivorous food web. We compared the food webs of six sites differing in the type and degree of metal pollution along two forest transects contaminated with copper or zinc. We measured 11 elements in the litter, herbivores, detritivores, predators and omnivores. Based on the concentrations of the elements, the differences between the trophic groups were visualized using PCA. At all the sites, the litter C:N, C:P, C:K and C:Na ratios were higher than those in the animals. The C:Cu, C:Zn and C:Ca ratios of the invertebrate trophic groups were significantly different from each other. The calculated resource:consumer N:P ratio suggests that invertebrates in the studied forests are N limited but not P limited. The presence of similar patterns at all the sites suggests that metal pollution at the studied intensity somewhat affects the transfer of elements in terrestrial macro-invertebrate food webs.

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金属污染会影响土壤垃圾食物网的化学计量吗？

摘要 迄今为止，生态化学计量学领域主要关注水生系统中的宏量元素。我们调查了陆地系统，并在研究中加入了微量元素，以评估有害食物网中的元素转移。我们比较了两个被铜或锌污染的森林横断面上金属污染类型和程度不同的六个地点的食物网。我们测量了垃圾、食草动物、碎屑动物、捕食者和杂食动物中的 11 种元素。基于元素的浓度，营养组之间的差异使用 PCA 可视化。在所有地点，垫料 C:N、C:P、C:K 和 C:Na 比率均高于动物。无脊椎动物营养组的 C:Cu、C:Zn 和 C:Ca 比率彼此显着不同。计算的资源：消费者 N：P 比率表明所研究森林中的无脊椎动物受 N 限制但不受 P 限制。所有地点都存在类似的模式表明，所研究强度的金属污染在一定程度上影响了陆地大型无脊椎动物食物网中元素的转移。