Abstract
Nagpur mandarin (Citrus reticulata Blanco), considered as one of the major commercial fruit crops, is grown in hot, dry and sub-humid bioclimatic region of Central India. Area under this cash crop is highest in the state Maharashtra, but low productivity as compared to other citrus-growing states of India is of a major concern. Information regarding the productive suitable areas for this crop cultivation in the state is lacking in order to address the problem. Hence, a study was conducted in Wardha district of Maharashtra to find out the most suitable soil-site characteristics for citrus orchards to enhance the productivity. In the present investigation, inductive modeling approach is used to derive the required properties. The objective was to compare the soil properties with the established suitability criteria for citrus to minimize soil-related constraints and thus to enhance the quantity as well as quality of the produce. The citrus-grown areas were visually interpreted from merged product of IRS LISS-IV and Cartosat-1 image of the study area. The healthy citrus orchard areas were identified based on normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) values derived from LISS-IV image. The layer which contained the information of higher NDVI values with citrus orchards was overlaid on the soil and slope map of the study area to obtain desired soil and slope information. Results revealed that heavy textured clay soils dominated the healthy citrus orchards. Soil reaction was alkaline (11.49 thousand ha) in majority of the areas followed by neutral (1.75 thousand ha) pH. Orchards were mostly located at very gently sloping condition, and in most of the cases, soils were very deep in nature. The study thus revealed the most suitable physical, fertility and chemical properties of soil and other properties like slope for better management of citrus-growing orchards in Maharashtra.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
References
Department of Agriculture and Co-operation (2017) Horticulture statistics at a glance. www.agricoop.nic.in. Accessed 1 Apr 2018
Srivastava AK, Singh S (2008) Analysis of citrus orchard efficiency in relation to soil properties. J Plant Nutr 30:2077–2090
Mani JK, Varghese AO (2018) Remote sensing and GIS in agriculture and forest resource monitoring. In: Obi Reddy GP, Singh SK (eds) Geospatial technologies in land resources mapping, monitoring and management. Springer, Berlin, pp 377–400. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-78711-4_19
Baja S, Chapman DM, Dragovich D (2007) Spatial based compromise programming for multiple criteria decision making in land use planning. Environ Model Assess 12:171–184
Overmars KP, Verburg PH, Veldkamp TA (2007) Comparison of a deductive and an inductive approach to specify land suitability in a spatially explicit land use model. Land Use Policy 24:587–599
Mani JK, Varghese AO, Rao SVCK (2016) Suitability analysis for Orange orchards in Vidarbha region of Maharashtra using remote sensing and GIS based models. In: Proceedings of the international conference on integrated land use planning for smart agriculture -an agenda for sustainable land management (ICILUPSA-2016). November 10–13, Nagpur
Department of Agriculture and Co-operation (2014) Agriculture contingency plan for District: WARDHA. www.agricoop.nic.in. Accessed 18 July 2015
Holme AM, Burnside DG, Mitchell AA (1987) The development of a system for monitoring trend in range condition in the arid shrublands of Western Australia. Aust Rangel J 9:14–20
Roderick M, Smith RCG, Ludwick G (1996) Calibrating long term AVHRR derived NDVI imagery. Remote Sens Environ 58:1–12
Naidu LGK, Ramamurthy V, Challa O, Hegde R, Krishnan P (2006) Soil-site suitability criteria for major crops. Publication No 129, NBSS&LUP, Nagpur, p 118
Srivastava AK, Kohli RR (1997) Soil suitability criteria for citrus: an appraisal. Agric Rev 18(3):139–146
Mohekar DS, Challa O (2000) Characterisation and classification of oranges growing soils in Nagpur district of Maharashtra and the effect of soil parameters on crop performance. Agropedology 10:173–182
National Horticulture Board (2015) Indian horticulture database – 2014. www.nhb.gov.in. Accessed 11 Apr 2018
Acknowledgements
Authors extend their sincere gratitude to Regional Remote Sensing Centre-Central, National Remote Sensing Centre, Indian Space Research Organisation, India and Indian Council of Agricultural Research, India for providing opportunity and facility to conduct the study.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Additional information
Publisher's Note
Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Significance statement
Despite having large area under the citrus crop, the state Maharashtra is facing difficulties in order to enhance the productivity as compared to other citrus-growing states of India. Hence, the study was aimed to assess major soil and slope properties of healthy citrus fruit crop with the help of GIS technology and to provide realistic management options to achieve the goal.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Debroy, P., Varghese, A.O., Suryavanshi, A. et al. Characterization of the Soil Properties of Citrus Orchards in Central India using Remote Sensing and GIS. Natl. Acad. Sci. Lett. 44, 313–316 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40009-020-00999-9
Received:
Revised:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40009-020-00999-9