Archives

In order to characterize the “Effect of conventional and organic farming practices on soil physico-chemical properties of Vertisol in Northern Karnataka” a field survey was carried out during 2014-2015 in farmers fields of Bagalkot District, which falls in the Northern dry Agro-climatic zone of the Karnataka state. The soil was deep black clayey in nature and neutral to alkaline in reaction with low salt content. The results of the study revealed that soils under organic farming system recorded significantly higher water holding capacity (62.05%), per cent porosity (52.56) and aggregate stability (64.57%) but significantly lower bulk density (1.26 Mg m^-3) than soils under conventional farming system (61.23, 44.75, 55.10% and 1.46 Mg m^-3 water holding capacity, per cent porosity, bulk density and aggregate stability, respectively) irrespective of different talukas of Bagalkot district.  The soil physical properties varied with soil depths also. The surface soil recorded significantly lesser water holding capacity (52.33%), bulk density (1.13 Mg mm^-3) and aggregate stability (56.79%), but per cent porosity (57.47) was significantly more. Organic farming practices improved physical properties of soil in both surface and sub-surface depths. Hence, it can be concluded that organic farming practice found to be better for improving soil major nutrients than conventional farming practice.

Key words: Organic manure, Green manure intercrop, Bio fertilizers, press-mud and FYM.