A rotting log provides habitat for thousands of living organisms that break down the wood and convert it into nutrients for the soil. Bacteria, fungi, insects, and other invertebrates each play a role in the decomposition process. As the log fully decays, it enriches the soil and supports a diverse ecosystem in the forest.

1. There is drama in a rotting log. Apparently lifeless and useless there on the ground, it harbors thousands of living things within and beneath it. Feeding on the wood of the log, living and dying, generation after generation of them, they convert it back into minerals which a fertile healthy forest soil must have. They also add the humus which not only helps the soil to hold its moisture but also aids in making the soil minerals usable as food by plants, including trees. Finally there is nothing left but crumbling punk shot through and through with the hyphae, or roots, of molds and mushrooms. Some of the common lower plant and animal forms found in a rotting log in our forest preserves are these: bacteria protozoa millipedes molds round worms (nematodes) roaches fungi (mushrooms) land snails and slugs crickets lichens earthworms fly larvae (maggots) mosses bugs beetle larvae centipedes beetles There is an interesting story in the way each of these plants and animals attacks the rotting log. The boring beetles, for instance, chew up the wood but the digestion is done by hosts of microscopic animals (protozoa) packed in their intestines. Earthworms have ferments in their saliva which convert the woody substances into sugar. Dead and dying trees, while they stand, furnish homes for many mammals and birds such as bats, squirrels, raccoons, possums, wrens, bluebirds, woodpeckers, wood ducks and owls. They furnish food for many of these. When they fall and lie there rotting they furnish homes and food for many other mammals, snakes and insects -- winter and summer. They play a vital part in encriching the soil, keeping it fertile and maintaining the abundant variety of life to be found in our natural forest. <br />