Invertebrate species produce taxon-specific acoustic profiles under controlled conditions
Soil degradation threatens food security, climate regulation, biodiversity and human wellbeing worldwide. Up to 75% of the worlds soils are already degraded, and in response, global restoration efforts are rapidly scaling up to meet international targets. Monitoring soil biodiversity recovery remains a major barrier to tracking restoration success, particularly for invertebrates that underpin key processes including nutrient cycling and soil aggregation. Traditional sampling methods are labour-intensive, destructive and poorly suited to long-term or landscape-scale monitoring. Soil ecoacoustics is rapidly emerging as a promising non-destructive soil biodiversity monitoring tool. However, its capacity for taxonomic resolution of invertebrate groups remains untested. Here, we present a proof-of-concept study that establishes the potential for a soil invertebrate acoustic classifier. We used a low-cost, sound-attenuated recording system and quantified 19 spectral and temporal audio features from six morphologically and behaviourally distinct invertebrate species under controlled conditions. Acoustic profiles differed among taxa and generally clustered into podous and apodous groups (i.e., organisms with legs versus those without). Variation was driven primarily by taxon identity rather than body mass, suggesting that acoustic signatures capture taxon-specific traits. This work provides a foundation for developing automated acoustic classifiers that could enable scalable, non-destructive soil biodiversity monitoring.