Comparative fertility evaluation of agricultural forest and rangeland soils at Hilkot Watershed, Battal, district Mansehra [Pakistan]
2000
Khan, I.A.
Laboratory investigations on the physico-chemical characteristics of Battal (District Mansehra) soils were carried out. The soil samples were collected from three different sites i.e. agricultural, forest and rangeland at two depths i.e. (0-31 cm) and (31-60 cm) and were analyzed separately for each property according to standard methods. Soil pH was slightly acidic with the mean values 6.80 plus minus 0.15, 6.50 plus minus 0:35 and 6.88 plus minus 0.21 in surface soil for agricultural, forest and rangeland sites, respectively. In sub-surface soil the pH was also slightly acidic in nature. In case of lime concentration, all the sites were slightly calcareous in nature. As regards the organic matter levels, all the sites were significantly different in organic matter concentrations at both the depth. The forest sites maintained maximum level of organic matter with the mean value of 4.57% plus minus 0.81, medium amount of organic matter was observed in rangeland site with the mean value of 1.75% plus minus 0.29 while agricultural site had low level of organic matter 1.21% and 0.94 % in surface and sub surface soil, respectively. Total nitrogen concentrations of all the sites varied significantly. The nitrogen concentrations with the mean values 0.092 %, 0.238% and 0.177% was recorded for agricultural, forest and rangeland sites, respectively. Available phosphorus concentrations of the study sites varied from 1.30 to 3.40, 0.55 to 2.10 and 0.80 to 1.30 mg kg-1 with the mean values of 2.30, 1.15 and 1.07 mg kg-1 in surface soil for agricultural, forest and rangeland sites, respectively. The mean values of potassium concentrations were 235.50, 318.00 and 305.59 mg kg-1 for agricultural, forest and rangeland sites, respectively. The results regarding the micronutrient, showed that all the sites of the area contained enough available copper, iron and manganese except zinc. It was found that all the samples collected from agricultural site were zinc deficient except three samples which were marginal, whereas remaining sites i.e. forest and rangeland have marginal concentration of zinc at both the depths. Correlation study revealed that there was positively significant (r = 0.51) correlation between pH and. organic matter in agricultural and forest sites whereas positive but non significant (r = 0.20) correlation was found in rangeland site. pH had negative but significant (r = -0.52) correlation with P in agricultural site whereas forest and rangeland showed positively non significant (r = 0.21, 0.23) correlation. The correlation results between organic matter and P showed positively non significant (r = 0.49, 0.32 and 0.31) relationship for all the sites.
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