Abstract: In order to study distribution of soil macroand meso-animal communities in the north suburbs of Urumqi,four sampling sites different in land use were selected and soil animals were collected in three different soil levels: 0-5,5-10 and 10-15 cm from May to July,2007.A total of 1 543 individuals of macro-and meso-animals were gathered,belonging to 18 order,9 classes and 3 phyla.Among them,Insecta,Gastropoda,Collembola and Arachnida were the dominant classes,which account for 80.04% of the all captured animals.Malacostraca and Diplura were the common species,accounting for 6.28%,whereas Diplopoda was the rare one,accounting for only 1.04%.Differences existed between the four sampling sites in species diversity and evenness indexes of the soil macro-and meso-animal communities.Natural woodlot was the highest in species diversity,while farmland the lowest,which was assumed to be related to difference in soil fertility(organic matter and nutrient contents),and application of agro-chemicals.The characteristics of vertical distribution of the soil animals showed an obvious feature of surface assembly in soil.

Key words: soil animal, species diversity, north suburbs of Urumqi