Nutrient Arteries

An interesting article from the BBC supporting some of the ideas that modern arable farming gives rise to largely sterile ecological wilderness and in contrast, pastoral farming can facilitate biodiversity:

• "The demise of big animals in the Amazon region 12,000 years ago cut a key way that nutrients were distributed across the landscape, a study has suggested.
  
  Researchers say animals such as huge armadillo-like creatures would have distributed vital nutrients for plants via their dung and bodies.
  
  The effects, still visible today, raise questions about the impact of losing large modern species like elephants."

It is worth reading the rest of Big animal extinction 'severed nutrient arteries to see how dung and bodies are important conduits in the dispersal of nutrients throughout any ecosystem.