Abstract
Soil testing is key to soil fertility management as it serves as a fertilizer application guide to farmers, scientists and consultants. It gives information on soil nutrient status and its supplying capacity. Laboratory (LB) procedures have been the most reliable approach for soil nutrients analyses. However, it is costly and nonpoint. Thus, the use of in–situ testing kit emerges and becomes prominent. Notwithstanding, applicability of soil testing kit must be validated by laboratory test. This work aimed to examine the reliability/suitability of Soil Testing Kit® Transchem (SK) in determining selected soil nutrients in Sahel Savannah, Nigeria. Twentyfive replicate soil samples were collected from 12°47’86’’-12°20’96’’N and 4°38’37’’-4°188’02’’E, Kebbi State Nigeria and used to test soil pH, N, P, K and soil organic carbon (SOC) by SK and LB. The SK uses colour chart and comparator for rating nutrients status qualitatively into; low, medium and high and up to very high for P. The LB results were transformed to qualitative data by corresponding the values with soil rating standardinto low, medium and high. To perform statistics, weighting was done by assigning weight load to each category; low = 1, medium = 2 and high = 3. The two methods were compared using t-test, regression and descriptive analyses. Results showed non-significant difference between the two methods for soil contents of N, P and K. However, SK poorly estimated soil pH and SOC. Correlation and regression coefficients (r = 0.915 and R2 = 0.838, respectively) indicated reliability of the SK. It is concluded that SK can be reliably used for N, P, and K but not soil pH and SOC estimation for soils in Sahel savannah of Nigeria.
Highlights
Soil analyses is critical in fertility management and site specific fertilizer use for sustainable crop performance and soil productivity (Bassey et al, 2009; Faber et al, 2007)
Faber et al (2007) compared performance of five colorimetric Soil Testing Kit® Transchem (SK) commonly available in perfect market with standard laboratory methods based on four key soil fertility parameters; soil pH, nitrate–nitrogen (NO3), phosphorus (P2O5) and K2O
The prepared samples were subjected to standard conventional laboratory (LB) and Soil Testing Kit® Transchem (SK) procedures for comparison
Summary
Soil analyses is critical in fertility management and site specific fertilizer use for sustainable crop performance and soil productivity (Bassey et al, 2009; Faber et al, 2007). The use of laboratory testing (LB) procedure has been the most reliable way of analysing soil nutrients. Howbeit, it is time cumbersome, costly, energy demanding, non-point and requires high man power. Applicability of SK must be based on its performance validated by LB test from representative soil under typical field condition of the region concerned (John, 2013). Faber et al (2007) compared performance of five colorimetric SK commonly available in perfect market with standard laboratory methods based on four key soil fertility parameters; soil pH, nitrate–nitrogen (NO3), phosphorus (P2O5) and K2O. Ogunlade et al (2019) compared soil pH results of LaMotte, Rapitest, and Hanna soil test kits with results obtained by conventional laboratory method in Cocoa plantation at Akwa Ibom and concluded that only Rapitest varied significantly with the conventional method as it could not test pH below 5
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