Content: The course exposes students to concepts of soil fertility, mechanisms of plant nutrient absorption, plant nutrient uptake properties, soil fertility amendments, fertilizer technology and use, and fertilizer interactions in soils. It also provides the students with the concepts in soil fertility evaluation, soil test methodology, and fertilizer recommendations. Physical, chemical and biological approaches for integrated soil fertility management are also presented, and the strategies for implementation are discussed.
The course entails processes of soil formation (factors-processes-properties), nature of soil variation and factors affecting soil variation, Scales and types of soil variation-systematic and random variation. The course also exposes students to sampling designs for quantifying map unit variations, types of land resources field studies, predicting variability of soils from landscape models-the catena concept, slope curvature landscape morphology and soil anisotropy.
Objective: To introduce the students to the concepts of soil fertility management and the fertilizer interactions in soils
Reading materials
- Bridges, E.M. and Davidson, D.A. 1982. Principles and applications of Soil Geography. Longman Press
- Buol, S.W., Hole, F.D. and McCracken, R.J. 1989. Soil Genesis and Classification. 3rd Edn. Wiley, New York
- Ripley, B.D. 1981. Spatial Statistics. Wiley, New York
- Wilding, L.P. and Drees, L.R. 1978. Spatial Variability: A Pedologists Viewpoint. In: Diversity of Soils in the Tropic. Soil Science Society of America Special Pub. 34