ABSTRACT

The study investigates the effect of various existing hill land-use practices on soil quality. The land-use types selected for the analysis was based on common land-use types practice in the area. Soil samples were collected from different land-use types and analysed for bulk density (BD), clay, sand, silt content, soil organic carbon, total nitrogen, available phosphorus, microbial biomass carbon and nitrogen (MBC and MBN), and exchangeable cations. Further, the soil fertility index, soil evaluation factor and Principal Component (PC) Analysis suggested that PC1 accounts maximum variance (41.6%) followed by PC2 (19.7%), PC3 (13.5%), PC4 (12.4%) and PC5 has the least variance (10.4%). Weighted soil quality index (SQI_w) was computed based on SQI_w. The majority of land-use samples showed a moderate quality of soil except for samples of current jhum (CJ) (SQI_w = 0.75) which is in the good category. Almost all the soil parameters except BD have a higher concentration in the settled agricultural farm owing to the integration of sustainable approaches (viz., integration of livestock manure, conservation tillage, mixed cropping and terracing). The present study indicates that long term settled sustainable land-uses agricultural practices are the key to maintain soil organic carbon, and soil health in the sloping hilly region of tropics.

摘要

该研究调查了各种现有的山地土地利用方式对土壤质量的影响。为分析选择的土地利用类型是基于该地区常见的土地利用类型实践。从不同土地利用类型收集土壤样品并分析容重 (BD)、粘土、沙子、淤泥含量、土壤有机碳、总氮、有效磷、微生物生物量碳和氮（MBC 和 MBN）以及可交换阳离子. 此外，土壤肥力指数、土壤评价因子和主成分（PC）分析表明，PC1的方差最大（41.6%），其次是PC2（19.7%）、PC3（13.5%）、PC4（12.4%），PC5的方差最大。最小方差（10.4%）。根据 SQI w 计算加权土壤质量指数 (SQI _{w ) 。}除了当前 jhum (CJ) (SQI _w  = 0.75) 的样本属于良好类别外，大多数土地利用样本显示出中等质量的土壤。由于可持续方法的整合（即牲畜粪便的整合、保护性耕作、混合种植和梯田），除了 BD 之外，几乎所有土壤参数在定居的农业农场中都具有更高的浓度。本研究表明，长期定居的可持续土地利用农业实践是保持热带斜坡丘陵地区土壤有机碳和土壤健康的关键。