Evaluation of Soil Health in the Unstable Ecosystem of Gorgan City

Abstract

The aim of this study was to assess the effect of land use change on health and soil quality of sloping lands in the south of Gorgan. Sampling was performed in July 2019 from only 2 shoulder slope and back slope positions and completely randomly from a depth of 0-20 cm of forest soil and adjacent cultivated land. The properties evaluated include percentage of soil organic carbon, percentage of soil texture components (sand, silt and clay), specific gravity of soil, percentage of soil equivalent lime, soil reaction, amounts of highly consumed elements (nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium) and cation exchange capacity as indicators of soil quality. The results showed that the highest coefficient of change as a result of land use change was related to the parameter of soil organic carbon percentage. Analysis of variance and mean comparison showed that the change of landuse from forest to agriculture has significantly reduced soil quality in all evaluated parameters except adsorbable phosphorus. Moreover, the study of soil organic carbon content as the most important indicator of soil quality showed that this parameter with an average of 6.07% in forest use and an average of 0.59% in agricultural use with a decrease of 90% as a result of land use change.

Keywords

• golestan province
• land use change
• soil quality
• soil organic carbon