A total of 48 soil samples were collected fortnightly in the months of June, July and August 1995, from four different stations of a waste-dump site. The samples were examined for temperature, pH and for the frequency of isolation of viable aerobic heterotrophic bacteria and fungi. The mean temperature values of the soils ranged from 27°C to 28°C while the mean pH values ranged from pH 5.4 to 7.9. The mean total viable aerobic hetertrophic bacteria population ranged from 0.38 x 10
6 CFU/g soil to 2.00x10
6 CFU/g soil while the mean total viable fungal population ranged from 1.9 x 10
4 CFU/g soil to 7.1 x 10
4 CFU/g soil. The bacteria with their frequency of isolation from the waste-dump soils were:
Arthrobacter
(4.7%),
Bacillus
(15.2%),
Escherichia coli
(12.1%),
Klebsiella
(9.6%),
Micrococcus
(2.5%),
Proteus
(10.2%),
Pseudomonas
(5.4%),
Serratia
(2.5%),
Staphylococcus
(21%) and
Streptococcus
(16.8%). Only
Bacillus,
E. coli,
Staphylococcus and
Streptococcus were isolated from all the stations. The fungi with their frequency of isolation were;
Aspergillus
(25.3%),
Fusarium
(5.4%),
Mucor
(11.5%),
Penicillium
(12.6%),
Rhizopus
(2.5%) and
Saccharomyces
(42.8%). All the fungi were isolated from all the stations. Statistical analysis using ANOVA (F - test) showed that there were no significant differences in the bacterial and fungal populations between the four stations. However, there was significant difference at 5% level for fungal populations between different sampling periods. @ JASEM
