%0 Research note
%T A new forest floor corer for rapid sampling, minimal disturbance and adequate precision
%A Nalder, Ian A.
%A Wein, Ross W.
%D 1998
%J Silva Fennica
%V 32
%N 4
%R doi:10.14214/sf.678
%U https://silvafennica.fi/article/678
%X We describe an effective and inexpensive device for sampling forest  floors. It is based on a rechargeable, battery-powered drill that drives  a sharpened steel coring tube. The corer is simple to fabricate, is  lightweight (3.5 kg) and can be used easily by one person to obtain  intact, natural volume cores of the forest floor. It has been used  extensively to obtain samples in 114 boreal forest stands of western  Canada. We found that coefficients of variation were typically 30% for  forest floor organic matter and bulk density, and tended to be higher in  Pinus banksiana stands than in Picea glauca and Populus tremuloides.  Ten samples per stand gave adequate precision for a study of forest  floor dynamics and autocorrelation did not appear to be a problem with  five-metre sampling intervals. In addition to sampling forest floors,  the corer has proven suitable for sampling moss and lichen layers and  mineral soil down to about 20 cm. A similar powered system can also be  used for increment boring of trees.