Studies on Soil Quality Under Natural Farming and Farmers Practice in Northern Dry Zone of Karnataka
- M.Sc. (Agri)
- Dharwad University of Agricultural Sciences 2024
- 163 32 Cms
ABSTRACT
Natural farming enriches soil by increasing microbial diversity, enhancing organic matter content and promoting soil structure stability. It reduces erosion, improves water retention and mitigates nutrient loss. This research was conducted to study soil quality in <5, 5-10 and 10-15 years under natural farming and farmers practice at 0-20 cm soil depth in three natural farming clusters of Belagavi district in Northern dry zone (Zone 3) of Karnataka during 2022-23. This study revealed that, natural farming had positive effect on soil physical, chemical and biological properties than the farmers practice. Bulk density under natural farming decreased over time (1.34 to 1.28 Mg m-3) but increased under farmers practice (1.40 to 1.46 Mg m-3). Soil porosity, MWHC and aggregate stability improved with natural farming (49.65% to 51.74%, 49.85% to 52.19% and 54.39% to 56.69%) respectively, but decreased under farmers practice (47.53% to 45.23%, 47.68% to 45.20% and 51.89% to 49.51%). Soil pH and electrical conductivity decreased whereas organic carbon, available nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium and sulphur levels increased over time in natural farming but in farmers practice decreased. Exchangeable cations (Ca, Mg, Na, K) and cation exchange capacity increased significantly under natural farming than under farmers practice. Dehydrogenase activity was more under natural farming in <5, 5-10 and 10-15 years than farmers practice. Soil quality index (SQI) values were highest in natural farming (0.89, 0.92 and 0.97) than farmers practices (0.87,0.85 and 0.78) in <5, 5-10 and 10-15 years but the value was highest (0.97) in 10-15 years category under natural farming which is superior over 5-10 and <5 years. The SQI values under natural farming belongs to very good class and good class under farmers practices. Overall, natural farming showed improvements in soil health over the years while farmers practices resulted in decline in soil quality.