The role of terrestrial saprophagous arthropods in forest soils: current status of concepts. Crossley 1977.
The role of terrestrial saprophagous arthropods in forest soils: current status of concepts. [pdf]Paper  abstract   bibtex   
Soil arthropods are envisioned as accelerating (or delaying) nutrient release from decomposing organic matter. They may do this directly: by feeding upon organic matter and associated microflora; or indirectly: by channeling and mixing of the soil, improving substrate quality for microflora, inoculation of organic debris with microbes, selective grazing upon microflora, and preventing senescence of microfloral populations. It will be noted that these effects are largely anecdotal because most are difficult to quantify in a satisfactory or meaningful way.

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