Influence of diversified cropping pattern on microbial activity and population dynamics in agricultural soils.

摘要

Agricultural practices that reduce soil degradation and improve agricultural sustainability are needed particularly for tropical/sub-tropical soils. Soil enzyme activities and microbial populations can provide information on how soil management is affecting the potential to perform the processes in soils such as decomposition and nutrient cycling. Soil enzyme activities and microbial population dynamics were investigated in an experiment on silt loam soil where three cropping patterns (chickpea/rice, wheat/rice and sunflower/rice) were studied under field conditions of Punjab (India). The enzyme activities showed that among the three cropping patterns, chickpea/rice showed good correlation between the cellulase and phosphatase activity and the cellulose and phosphate degraders and also increase in nutrient availability due to these enzyme activities, while in the sunflower/rice both enzyme activities decreased during the sunflower cropping but recovered during the rice crop. Thus, among the three cropping patterns chickpea/rice appears to be more sustainable.