Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
A nutrient cycle (or ecological recycling) is the movement and exchange of inorganic and organic matter back into the production of matter. Energy flow is a unidirectional and noncyclic pathway, whereas the movement of mineral nutrients is cyclic.
Soil quality reflects how well a soil performs the functions of maintaining biodiversity and productivity, partitioning water and solute flow, filtering and buffering, nutrient cycling, and providing support for plants and other structures. Soil management has a major impact on soil quality. Soil quality relates to soil functions. Unlike water ...
Soil health as an expression derives from organic or "biological farming" movements in Europe, however, well before soil quality was first applied as a discipline around 1990. In 1978, Swiss soil biologist Dr Otto Buess wrote an essay "The Health of Soil and Plants" which largely defines the field even today.
Soil microbial communities experience shifts in the diversity and composition during dehydration and rehydration cycles. [5] Soil moisture affects carbon cycling a phenomenon known as Birch effect. [6] [7] Temperature variations in soil are influenced by factors such as seasonality, environmental conditions, vegetation, and soil composition.
The benefits of SOM result from several complex, interactive, edaphic factors; a non-exhaustive list of these benefits to soil function includes improvement of soil structure, aggregation, water retention, soil biodiversity, absorption and retention of pollutants, buffering capacity, and the cycling and storage of plant nutrients.
Base-cation saturation ratio (BCSR) is a method of interpreting soil test results that is widely used in sustainable agriculture, supported by the National Sustainable Agriculture Information Service (ATTRA) [1] and claimed to be successfully in use on over a million acres (4,000 km 2) of farmland worldwide.
Cover crops manage soil erosion, soil fertility, soil quality, water, weeds, pests, diseases, biodiversity and wildlife in an agroecosystem—an ecological system managed and shaped by humans. Cover crops can increase microbial activity in the soil, which has a positive effect on nitrogen availability, nitrogen uptake in target crops, and crop ...
Role in Soil Fertility: HSs are the primary components of soil organic matter. They are important for soil quality and fertility. Impact on Aquatic Systems: In aquatic ecosystem, HSs affect pH, alkalinity, and the chemical cycling of elements. Though Humic acid contributes to water pollution by altering colour and forming harmful by-products ...