1ICRISAT Development Center, International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics, Patancheru, Telangana, India
2Former Visiting Scientist in, ICRISAT
3Present address: Dr Balasaheb Sawant Konkan Krishi Vidyapeeth, Dapoli, 415 712, India
Online published on 17 February, 2017.
We studied the logic of blanket recommendation of Walkley Black Recovery Factor (WBRF) with a set of ∼1000 shrink-swell soil samples with varying clay content, representing two important food growing zones namely the Indo-Gangetic Plains and the Black Soil Region (BSR). Since clay and organic matter form strong clay complexes, we investigated how quantity of clay can influence recovery of organic matter from soils analyzed following standard procedure. Increase in clay content, soil depth and aridity (low rainfall) have similar effect in increasing WBRF due to decreased organic matter recovery. While the relation is a straightforward in low clay soils, the study showed that recovery of organic matter remains unaffected for BSR soil clays > 60% warranting a new initiative for an inter facial research to link pedology and edaphology.
WBRF, Soil, Clay, Recovery, Organic matter
