Cropping system and soil texture shape soil health outcomes and scoring functions

Abstract

Inherent soil properties often define the soil's basic functions, but human management can have superimposing impacts on the quality of soil. It is therefore challenging to interpret Soil Health (SH) measurements in the context of a region's soils and cropping systems. We examined the effects of soil texture, a dominant inherent soil property, and cropping system on SH indicators for New York, USA soils. A dataset of 1,750 soil samples was analyzed for SH indicators including Soil Organic Matter (SOM), Permanganate-Oxidizable Carbon (POXC), Soil Respiration (Resp), soil protein (Protein), Available Water Capacity (AWC), Wet Aggregate Stability (WAS), surface and subsurface penetration resistance, and seven soil chemical properties. Measured physical and biological indicators were affected by both soil texture and cropping system. AWC measured on disturbed samples was mostly affected by texture (37.4% variance explained), while Resp, Protein, and WAS were mostly impacted by cropping system (11.7%, 14.7%, and 22.1% variance explained, respectively). POXC was equally affected by texture and cropping system. Pasture and Mixed Vegetable systems tended to have the highest biological and physical soil health, followed by Dairy Crop systems. Annual Grain and Processing Vegetable cropping systems tended to have the lowest soil health. The effects of cropping systems are presumably linked to differences in the carbon and nutrient balances and the amount of soil disturbance through tillage. New scoring functions based on soil texture classes and cropping systems were developed for New York State to facilitate interpretation of SH test results in the context of the production-specific environments.