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Predictions of soil bulk density and field capacity at 0-10, 10-20 and 20-30 cm depths in Rhodic and Xhantic Ferralsols at the Havana-Matanzas plain are validated at a number of measured sites. It was done in order to compare the prediction accuracy under the constraint of a small data set by the following three procedures: (1) soil maps, (2) kriging, considering Xhantic and Rhodic Ferralsols as different...
Although biotic communities have long been recognized as important factors in soil development, especially of A horizons, few studies have addressed their influence on soil physical properties in nonagricultural settings. A biosequence of 50-year-old soils supporting near monocultures of Coulter pine (Pinus coulteri), scrub oak (Quercus dumosa), and chamise (Adenostoma fasciculatum) was used to determine...
Ferralsols under native vegetation have a weak to moderate macrostructure and a well-developed microstructure corresponding to subrounded microaggregates that are usually 80 to 300 μm in size. The aim of this study was to analyze how the hydraulic properties of a clay Ferralsol were affected by a change of structure when the native vegetation is cleared for pasture. We studied the macrostructure in...
Soil saturated hydraulic conductivity (K s ) is an important soil physical property. Some laboratory and field methods are expensive, time consuming and labour intensive. Indirect methods such as pedo-transfer functions (PTF) are available. Effective porosity or macroporosity (O e ) is approximately equals to porosity minus volumetric soil water content at the field capacity. According...
Effects of six different forage cropping treatments, perennial ryegrass (RG), alfalfa (AL), bromegrass (BR), small burnet (SB), subterranean clover (SC) and purple crownvetch (CV), on soil structural parameters such as, mean weight diameter (MWD), aggregate stability (AS), dispersion ratio (DR), bulk density (BD) and penetration resistance (PNTR) were determined. Forage cropping decreased the proportion...
Land use change can lead to changes in a range of soil properties, including soil carbon (C) and nitrogen (N) content, bulk density and pH. Previous investigations on the effects of land use change have been biased towards the impact of forest clearing and afforestation in tropical environments. Therefore, the aim of this study is to determine the impact of a conversion from cropland to grassland...
A 13-year long-term experiment on the Loess Plateau of China was used to evaluate the effect of two different fertilizer regimes on the soil's physical/hydraulic properties. The fertilizer regimes included (i) control without any fertilizer (C), (ii) applications of chemical fertilizer (NPK), and (iii) applications of chemical fertilizer plus dairy manure (MNPK). Undisturbed soil cores were collected...
Peat domes in Kalimantan (Indonesia) are reported to loose their dome shape as a result of disturbance such as logging and artificial drainage. The loss of the dome shape can be caused by (a combination of) two major processes: compaction and oxidation. Because natural, undisturbed peat is a major sink for atmospheric CO 2 , the distinction between the two processes is of utmost importance...
The objective of this paper is to determine to what extent pedotransfer functions, PTFs, can be developed that have few coefficients and which are insensitive to soil type. The use of non-linear PTFs to predict penetrometer resistance of soils from their water status (matric potential, ψ and degree of saturation, S) and bulk density, ρ, appears to require that some other soil property, such as sand...
Land disturbances (such as cultivation and overgrazing) and global warming have been decreasing soil organic C stocks in alpine regions of China. This study characterized changes in soil aggregation, bulk density, particle density, porosity and water holding capacity in relation to changes in total organic C and carbohydrate-C fractions under a long-term (28 years) annually-cultivated pasture (oats),...
Soil organic carbon (SOC) stocks are a function of the SOC concentration and the bulk density of the fine soil. Both variables are prone to changes and are influenced by abiotic and biotic processes. To determine the effect of variations of both variables on SOC stocks at two grassland sites, one with Stagnic Vertisols and one with Orthoeutric Arenosols, 440 soil cores were sampled down to 60cm depth...
It is not clear from the literature whether heavy grazing leads to a deterioration of physical and chemical parameters of topsoils in steppe ecosystems. We sampled five sites in northern China with different grazing intensities, ranging from ungrazed since 1979 to heavily grazed, at 540 sampling points to a depth of 0–4 cm. Each sample was analysed for bulk density, organic carbon (OC), total nitrogen...
It is shown that, for mineral soils, it is not the total amount of organic carbon (or organic matter) that controls soil physical behaviour but the amount of complexed organic carbon (COC). We assume that this complex is formed by the association of unit mass (i.e. 1 g) of organic carbon with n grams of clay. Analysis of data from two French and two Polish databases shows that, for these soils, n=10...
Soil structure is known to affect water and solute movement and to characterize soil quality. For paddy fields, the soil structure has not been explored nor discussed in detail with respect to rice crop nutrient uptake and root development. The objectives were to visualize the size and connectivity of structural pores including arrangement of aggregates and to quantify the vertical bulk density distribution...
Soils on a series of debris flow deposits, ranging from <1 to 244 years old, were described and sampled in order to investigate the early stages of soil development. The parent material at the site is debris flow regolith, composed mainly of gneiss, the soil moisture regime is xeric, and the vegetation is mixed coniferous forest. Ages of the deposits were assessed using dendrochronology. Morphologic...
Soil physical quality (SPQ) is assessed by comparing values of “indicator” soil properties (e.g. bulk density, air capacity) to “ideal ranges” established in the literature. These ideal ranges may not be optimal for any particular soil or field site, however, as they are only “guidelines” based on broad soil types. The objective of this study was to determine if more relevant estimates of optimal...
The soil compaction by vehicles is a major factor responsible for physical degradation of cultivated soils. Uniaxial confined compression tests are usually performed to characterise the compaction properties of soil. Two main forms of compression curve have been observed: (i) the bi-linear curve having an elastic rebound curve at low stresses and a linear virgin compression curve at higher stresses;...
Soil aggregation is of great importance in agriculture due to its positive effect on soil physical properties, plant growth and the environment. A long-term (1996–2008) field experiment was performed to investigate the role of mycorrhizal inoculation and organic fertilizers on some of soil properties of Mediterranean soils (Typic Xerofluvent, Menzilat clay–loam soil). We applied a rotation with winter...
Mining causes drastic disturbances in landscape and soil properties, and reclamation can restore soil quality over time. Thus, assessing changes in properties of reclaimed mine soils is essential to understanding the effects of the reclamation techniques. This study was aimed at quantifying the effects of mining and reclamation processes on physical and chemical properties of reclaimed soils for three...
The contribution of rock fragments to the soil available water content (SAWC) of stony soil has been quantified by measurements of bulk density and gravimetric water content at different water potentials on rock fragments of different lithologies: flints, cherts, chalks, gaizes and limestones. More than 1000 pebbles (2cm<equivalent diameter of the rock fragment<5cm) have been sampled in stony...
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