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THE INFLUENCE OF VARIOUS ROTATIONS ON COARSE‐TEXTURED SOILS AT CHAPMAN AND WONGAN HILLS RESEARCH STATIONS, WESTERN AUSTRALIA
Author(s) -
DROVER D. P.
Publication year - 1956
Publication title -
journal of soil science
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.244
H-Index - 111
eISSN - 1365-2389
pISSN - 0022-4588
DOI - 10.1111/j.1365-2389.1956.tb00878.x
Subject(s) - soil water , nitrogen , agronomy , environmental science , crop rotation , carbon fibers , soil carbon , pasture , total organic carbon , crop , soil science , mathematics , chemistry , environmental chemistry , biology , organic chemistry , algorithm , composite number
Summary The effect of four wheat rotations on soil organic carbon and nitrogen in two long‐term experiments at Chapman and Wongan Hills Research Stations is discussed. The experiments compare continuous wheat, fallow‐wheat, fallowwheat‐pasture, and fallow‐wheat‐z years lupins. On the assumption that adjacent uncultivated soils were comparable in carbon and nitrogen to the original virgin soils, the four‐course rotation is at each site the only one which maintained soil nitrogen at levels approaching those of the virgin soils. The two‐ and three‐course rotations, including in each case a year of fallow, by contrast, produced serious losses in both carbon and nitrogen at both localities, but particularly at Chapman. The soil‐nitrogen data support the hypothesis of Shier and Cullinane (1948) that these levels are influencing wheat yield and the flour quality of the grain. The data emphasize, also, the very low nitrogen and carbon contents of these soils both in the virgin condition and after zz years of a four‐course rotation in which half of each +year period was occupied by a leguminous crop. It is concluded that much longer periods under legumes are necessary if the carbon and nitrogen levels of these soils are to approach those typical of known highly fertile soils elsewhere.