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?
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. Half of all our species exist underfoot, and just a handful of soil can contain an entire world. Without soil, there would be no life as we know it.
In a story of connection and communication, we meet pioneering plants and minute animals that are essential to the health and wellbeing of our planet. We learn how soil makes our very existence possible, allowing us to cultivate crops as well as storing precious carbon and the water we need to survive. We marvel at soil as the Earth's fertiliser and one the building blocks of evolution, transforming decaying matter into the birthplace of new life.
Dr Frank Ashwood is a soil ecologist and macrophotographer, specialising in soil invertebrates. He is a Lecturer of Ecology and Entomology at Lincoln University in New Zealand, and received his PhD from University of Lancashire in 2016. Frank has previously worked as a scientist for Forest Research, part of the British Government’s Forestry Commission. He is Associate Editor of the New Zealand Journal of Zoology and member of the Royal Society of Biology. Frank has appeared on the BBC Earth Podcast, BBC Breakfast, ABC Landline, and his soil animal photography has been featured in The Guardian and The New York Times , and has been exhibited internationally.
Dr Erica McAlister is a Principal Curator for Diptera and Siphonaptera in the Department of Life Sciences at the Natural History Museum. She is the President of Amateur Entomology Society, and sits the committee for the Dipterists Forum, and the International Congress of Dipterology. She has published five popular science books, including one titled 'The Secret life of F