Abstract
Soil organic matter (SOM) has been proposed as an index of N supply in paddy soils although field validations are few. We evaluated the relationship between the indigenous N supply (N i ) of the soil-floodwater system and soil organic carbon (SOC) or total N (N t ) in surface soil of long-term fertility experiments (LTFEs) at 11 sites, in 42 farmer's fiels with similar soil type, and in the same field in ten consecutive rice (Oryza sativa L.) crops. The N i was estimated by crop N uptake from plots without applied N (N o plots) under otherwise favorable growth conditions. There was a tight linear correlation between yields and N uptake in N o plots and tremendous variation in both parameters among LTFE sites, farmer's fields, and in the same field over time. Correlation between N i and SOC or N t explained little of this variation. Factors likely to contribute to the poor correlation were: (1) inputs of N from sources other than N mineralization of SOM in surface soil, (2) degree of congruence between soil N supply and crop demand, which is sensitive to soil drying, length of fallow, crop rotation, and residue management, and (3) differences in SOM quality related to intensive cropping in submerged soil. Better understanding of the processes governing the N i of tropical lowland rice systems would contribute to the development of crop management practices that optimize utilization of indigenous N resources.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
App A, Santiago T, Daez C, Menguito C, Ventura W, Tirol A, Po J, Watanabe I, De Datta S K and Roger P 1984 Estimation of the nitrogen balance for irrigated rice and the contribution of phototropic nitrogen fixation. Field Crops Res. 9, 17–27.
App A A, Watanabe I, Ventura T S, Bravo M and Jurey C D 1986 The effect of cultivated and wild rice varieties on the nitrogen balance of flooded soil. Soil Sci. 141, 448–452.
Bauer A and Black A L 1994 Quantification of the effect of soil organic matter content on soil productivity. Soil Sci. Am. J. 58, 185–193.
Bell M A 1993 Organic matter, soil properties, and wheat production in the high valley of Mexico. Soil Sci. 156, 86–92.
Bondietti E, Martin J P and Haider K 1972 Stabilization of amino sugar units in humic-type polymers. Soil Sci. Soc. Am. Proc. 36, 597–602.
Bremner J M and Mulvaney C S 1982 Nitrogen-total. In Methods of Soil Analysis, Part 2. Eds. A L Page et al. pp 595–624. Am. Soc. Agron., Madison, USA.
Buresh R J, Austin E R and Craswell E T 1982 Analytical mehtods in 15N research. Fert. Res. 3, 37–62.
Cassman K G and Pingali P L 1995 Intensification of irrigated rice systems: Learning from the past to meet future challenges. Geo-Journal 35, 299–305.
Cassman K G, De Datta S K, Olk D C, Alcantara J M, Samson M I, Descalsota J and Dizon M 1995 Yield decline and the nitrogen economy of long-term experiments on continuous irrigated rice systems in the tropics. In Soil Management: Experimental Basis for Sustainability and Environmental Quality. Eds. R Lal and B A Stewart. pp 181–222. Lewis/CRC Publishers, Boca Raton, FL, USA.
Cassman K G, Gines G C, Dizon M A., Samson M I and Alcantara J M 1996 Nitrogen use efficiency in tropical lowland rice systems: Contributions of indigenous soil resources and applied nitrogen inputs. Field Crops Res. (In press).
Cassman K G, Kropff M J, Gaunt J and Peng S 1993 Nitrogen use efficiency of rice reconsidered: what are the key constraints? Plant and Soil 155/156, 359–362.
Cassman K G, Kropff M J and Yan Zhende 1994 A conceptual framework for nitrogen, management of irrigated rice in high-yield environments. In Hybrid Rice Technology. New Developments and Future Prospects. Ed. S S Virmani. pp 81–96. International Rice Research Institute, Los Banos, Philippines.
Castaneda A R and Bhuiyan S I 1991 Nitrate-nitrogen concentrations in shallow groundwater underneath ricefields. Phillipp. J. Crop Sci. 16, 57–62.
Colberg P J 1988 Anaerobic microbial degradation of cellulose, lignin, oligolignols, and monaromatic lignin derivatives. In Biology of Anaerobic Microorganisms. Ed. A J B Zender. pp 333–372. John Wiley and Sons, New York, USA.
De Datta S K, Gomez K A and Descalsota J 1988 Changes in yield response to major nutrients and in soil fertility under intensive rice cropping. Soil Sci. 146, 350–358.
Dobermann A, Langner H, Mutscher H, Yang J E, Skogley E O, Adviento M A and Pampolino M F 1994 Nutrient adsorption kinetics of ion exchange resin capsules: A study with soils of international origin. Commun. Soil Sci. Plant Anal. 25, 1329–1353.
Dobermann A, Cassman K G and Sta Cruz P C 1996 Fertilizer inputs, nutrient balance and soil nutrient supplying power in intensive, irrigated rice ecosystems. II. Effective soil K supplying capacity. Fert. Res. (In press).
Dolmat M T, Patrick W H and Peterson F J 1980 Relation of available soil nitrogen to rice yield. Soil Sci. 129, 229–237.
Dorich R A and Nelson D W 1984 Evaluation of manual cadmium reduction methods for determination of nitrate in potassium chloride extracts of soil. Soil Sci. Soc. Am. J. 48, 72–75.
Eskew D, Eaglesham A R and App A A 1981 Heterotrophic 15N2 fixation and distribution of newly fixed nitrogen in a rice-flooded soil system. Plant Physiol. 68, 48–52.
Fageria N K 1976 Critical P, K, Ca, and Mg contents in the tops of rice and peanut plants. Plant and Soil 45, 421–431.
Fujisaka S 1994 Were farmers wrong in rejecting a recommendation? The case of nitrogen at transplanting for irrigated rice. Agric. Syst. 43, 271–286.
Hasegawa T and Horie T 1984 A simplified model for estimating nitrogen mineralization in paddy soil. Jpn. J. Crop Sci. 63, 496–501.
Inubushi K, Wada H and Takai Y 1985 Easily decomposable organic matter in paddy soil. VI. Kinetics of nitrogen mineralization in submerged soil. Soil Sci. Plant Nutr. 31, 563–572.
Janssen B H, Guiking F C T, Van der Eijk D, Smaling E M A, Wolf J and Van Reuler H 1990 A system for quantitative evaluation of the fertility of tropical soils. Geoderma 46, 299–318.
Kai H, Masayna W and Yamada Y 1989 Nitrogen behavior in tropical wetland rice soils. 1. Nitrogen supplying capacities. Fert. Res. 5, 259–271.
Kempers A and Zweers A 1986 Ammonium determination in soil extracts by the salicylate method. Commun. Soil Sci. Plant Anal. 17, 715–723.
Keerthisinghe G, Mengel K and De Datta S K 1984 The release of nonexchangeable ammonium (15N labelled) in wetland rice soils. Soil Sci. Soc. Am. J. 48, 291–294.
Kropff M J, Cassman K G, van Laar H H and Peng S 1993 Nitrogen and yield potential of irrigated rice. Plant and Soil 155/156, 391–394.
Mikkelsen D S and Hunziker R R 1971 A plant analysis survey of California Rice. Agrichem. 14, 18–22.
Nambiar K K M and Ghosh A B 1984 Highlights of research of long-term fertilizer experiments in India. In LTFE Bulletin No. 1. Indian Council of Agric. Res., New Delhi, India.
Olk D C, Cassman K G, Randall E W, Kinchesh P, Sanger L J and Anderson J M 1996 Changes in chemical structure of soil organic matter with intensified rice cropping in tropical lowland soils. Eur. J. Soil Sci. (In press).
Peng S, Garcia F V, Gines H C, Laza R C, Samson M I, Sanico A L, Visperas R M and Cassman K G 1996 Comparison of fertilizer nitrogen use efficiency of broadcast wet-seeded and transplanted rice in irrigated systems of the tropics. Fert. Res (In press).
Philippine Bureau of Soils and Water Management 1994 Soil map of Nueva Ecija at the 1:50,000 scale. Dept. of Agriculture, Quezon City, Phillippines.
Ponnamperuma F N 1980 Nitrogen supply in tropical wetland rice soil. In Proceedings of the special workshop on nitrogen fixation and utilization in rice fields, 28–30 April 1980, International Rice Research Institute, Los Baños, Philippines.
Sahrawat K L 1982 Assay of nitrogen supplying capacity of tropical rice soils. Plant and Soil 6, 111–121.
Sahrawat K L 1983 Mineralization of soil organic nitrogen under waterlogged conditions in relation to other soil properties of tropical soils. Aust. J. Soil Res. 21, 133–138.
SAS Institute Inc 1990 SAS/STAT Users Guide, Version 6. Vol. 2, 4th ed. SAS Institute Inc, Cary, North Carolina, USA. pp 1661–1666.
Schnitzer M and Skinner S I M 1966 Organo-metallic interaction in soils: 5. Stability constants of Cu2+-, Fe2+- and Zn-fulvic acid complexes. Soil Sci. 102, 361–365.
Sekiya S and Shiga H 1977 Role of subsoil of paddy field in nitrogen supply to rice plants. Jpn. Agric. Res. Q. 11, 95–100.
Shiga H and Ventura W 1976 Nitrogen supplying capacity of paddy soils under field conditions in the Philippines. Soil Sci. Plant Nutr. (Tokyo) 22, 387–399.
Suenobu S, Yamamoto T, Inoue K and Kadoshige K 1993 Evaluation of soil nitrogen mineralization and nitrogen uptake; by rice plants from subsoil of paddy soils. Bull. Fukuoka Agric. Res. Cent. A- 12, 11–14.
Tanaka A and Yoshida S 1970 Nutritional disorders of the rice plant in Asia. Technical Bulletin No. 10. International Rice Research Institute, Los Baños, Philippines.
Ventura W and Watanabe I 1984 Dynamics of nitrogen availability in lowland rice soils: The role of soil below plow layer and effect of moisture. Philipp. J. Crop Sci. 9, 135–142.
Verma L, Martin J P and Haider K 1975 Decomposition of carbon-14-labelled proteins, peptides, and amino acids-, free and complexed with humic polymers. Soil Sci. Soc. Am. Proc. 39, 279–294.
Watanabe F S and Olsen S R 1965 Test of an ascorbic acid method for determining phosphorus in water and sodium bicarbonate extracts of soil. Soil Sci. Soc. Am. Proc. 29, 677–678.
Wopereis M C S 1993 Quantifying the impact of soil and climate variability on rainfed rice production. Ph. D. dissertation, Dept. Theoretical Froduction Ecology, Wageningen Agric. University, the Netherlands.
Yonebayashi K and Hattori T 1986 Patterns and factors controlling nitrogen mineralization in paddy soils in tropical and temperate regions. Soil Sci. Plant Nutr. (Tokyo) 32, 407–420.
Yoshida S 1980 Fundamentals of Rice Crop Science. International Rice Research Institute, Los Baños, Philippines.
Zeikus J G 1980 Fate of lignin and related aromatic substrates in anaerobic environments. In Lignin Biodegradation Microbiology, Chemistry, and Potential Applications, Volume I. Eds. T H Kirk, T Higuchi and H Chang. pp 101–109. CRC Press, Boca Raton, FL, USA.
Zhu Z, Cai G, Xu Y and Zhang S 1984 Nitrogen mineralization of paddy soils in Tai-lake region and the prediction of soil nitrogen supply. Acta Pedol. Sin. 21, 29–36.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Cassman, K.G., Dobermann, A., Cruz, P.C.S. et al. Soil organic matter and the indigenous nitrogen supply of intensive irrigated rice systems in the tropics. Plant Soil 182, 267–278 (1996). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00029058
Received:
Accepted:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00029058