Volume 30, Number 5, 2006

Soil acidity is one of the chief factors of constraint on agricultural production. Lime is the most used corrective, but, apart from the incorporation layer, of slow mobility and slow correction in the soil profile. Other products have been tested for acidity correction such as silicates or the reduction of acidity effects in deeper soil layers with gypsum. This study compared the effect of lime, gypsum and silicates to supply calcium, magnesium, silicate and to correct soil pH in deeper […]

In highly weathered tropical soils the diffusive flux is the main transport mechanism of Zn, Cu, Fe, and Mn to the root surface of plants. Management practices such as liming and the presence of plant residues can alter the diffusive flux of these cationic micronutrients. The aim of the present study was to evaluate the diffusive flux in anionic and cationic forms and bioavaiability of cationic micronutrients Zn, Cu, Fe and Mn in Oxisols with distinct textures as influenced by […]

Lime mobility and soil acidity correction can be influenced by liming management and the quantity and quality of soil organic matter. Acidity neutralization in function of the lime incoporation and surface liming was evaluated in a red Latosol (Oxisol) under different antecedent vegetation covers (eucalyptus, forest, pasture and pine). The study was carried out from November 2002 to January 2003 at the Soil Science Department of the Lavras Federal University. After 30 days of incubation of soils with lime, the […]

The criteria currently used in Southern Brazil for the definition of the nitrogen (N) rate to be applied in maize are based on the soil organic matter content, the expected grain yield and the characteristics of the previous crop. Although the carbon:nitrogen (C/N) ratio is high, black oat is the most commonly used winter species antecedent to commercial summer crops. This characteristic can result in soil N immobilization, N plant deficiency and reduced grain yield in maize. Although the antecedent […]

The 13C natural abundance technique was applied to study C dynamics after land-use change from native savanna to Brachiaria, Pinus, and Eucalyptus in differently textured Cerrado Oxisols. But due to differences in the d13C signatures of subsoils under native savanna and under introduced species, C substitution could only be calculated based on results of cultivated soils nearby. It was estimated that after 20 years, Pinus C had replaced only 5 % of the native C in the 0-1.2 m layer, in which substitution […]

The use of pig slurry before implanting cover crops in the fall/winter is becoming a common practice in southern Brazil, although its effects on crops and soil are still poorly investigated. The objective of the present study was to analyze the dynamics of soil N as well as to study the cover crop yields under use of pig slurry in the fall/winter. The study was developed in the growing season 2000 on an experimental area of the Soils Department of […]

The effect of irrigation on soil C stocks is a result of the balance between the effect of this practice on C input through crop residues and of C losses through microbial decomposition of soil organic matter (SOM). This study aimed at assessing the influence of sprinkler irrigation on SOM dynamics and on the total C stocks in a subtropical Acrisol under no-till (NT) and conventional tillage (CT) in a long-term experiment (8 years). Irrigation increased the C addition (about […]