Responses of soil microbial resource limitation to multiple fertilization strategies

Abstract

Fertilization is a key management practice for maintaining or improving soil fertility in agro-ecosystems. Nevertheless, how fertilization strategies impact the status of soil microbial resource limitation is poorly understood. Here, we investigated the effects of long-term (11 years) fertilization on microbial resource limitation in a karst cropland under maize–soybean rotation. Soil microbial resource limitation was assessed using enzymatic stoichiometry. Six fertilization strategies were included, i.e., i) no fertilization (control), ii) inorganic fertilizers only (NPK), iii) inorganic fertilizers plus a low amount of straw (LSNPK), iv) inorganic fertilizers plus a low amount of manure (LMNPK), v) inorganic fertilizers plus a high amount of straw (HSNPK), and vi) inorganic fertilizers plus a high amount of manure (HMNPK). Overall, soil microbes were not limited by nitrogen, but co-limited by carbon and phosphorus across the six fertilization strategies. However, the degrees of microbial resource limitations were different between the control and fertilizer treatments. Application with inorganic fertilizers only aggravated microbial carbon limitation, but combined application of inorganic fertilizers and organic matters did not change the status of carbon limitation relative to the control. None of the fertilizer treatments changed the status of microbial nitrogen limitation. The treatments of NPK, LSNPK and LMNPK alleviated microbial phosphorus limitation, but HSNPK and HMNPK had no significant effects on phosphorus limitation relative to the control. By contrast, the crop production had no significant difference among all fertilizer treatments in the current study. Together, our results indicate that fertilizations can change microbial resource limitation status, which might be a more sensitive indicator to identify effective fertilization strategies relative to the crop production. Here we suggest that karst croplands do not need too much nitrogen fertilizer due to the nitrogen-rich characteristic, and that combined inorganic and organic fertilization strategies are better than single fertilization strategy in karst croplands.