N, P, and K Budgets and Changes in Selected Topsoil Nutrients over 10 Years in a Long-Term Experiment with Conventional and Organic Crop Rotations

Abstract EN

This study presents soil system budgets of N, P and K in six contrasting cropping systems during 10 years of a long-term experiment in southeast Norway.

The experiment included systems with arable cash-cropping and with mixed arable-dairy cropping (cash- and fodder crops), with organic and conventional management represented in both groups.

All major nutrient inputs and outputs were measured or estimated.

State of the art conventional cash-cropping appeared to be balanced in terms of N, whereas conventional mixed cropping had an N surplus.

By contrast, less up to date conventional arable cash-cropping and all the organic systems showed indications of soil organic N depletion (negative N budgets).

All the organic systems showed that mining of the soil P and K content occurs, whereas the conventional systems all had P and K surpluses.

The results corresponded well with measured differences between systems in terms of ignition loss, P-AL, K-AL and K-HNO3 measured in 2009.

This study shows that a fertile soil may be exposed to substantial mining of N, P and K over many years before it is detectable by traditional analyses, and that field nutrient budgeting is a feasible, but data-demanding, approach to detect such misbalances at an early stage.