ORGANIC MATTER AND CARBON MANAGEMENT INDEX OF SOIL TREATED WITH COMPOSTED AND NON-COMPOSTED LAYERED RESIDUES

ABSTRACT The use of organic residues and compost is a common practice to improve soil quality and content of organic matter. In this study, the labile and stable fractions of soil organic matter were evaluated after application of layers of fresh (non-composted) or composted organic residues in a 6-year-old citrus orchard. The experiment was set up as a randomized block design, with 6 treatments: control without NPK, control with NPK, non-composted organic residue (NCOR, with and without NPK), and composted organic residue (humus, with and without NPK), with three replicates. The treatments were applied under the plant canopy. Soil samples were collected from the 0-0.05, 0.05-0.10, and 0.10-0.15 m layers. There were increases of 10.3, 22.4, 16.3, and 37.1 % in the organic carbon contents of the surface soil for the treatments using NCOR without NPK, NCOR with NPK, humus with NPK, and humus without NPK, respectively. The organic carbon contents of the labile fraction varied from 1.0 to 12.8 g kg-1, representing between 8 and 62 % of the total carbon. The carbon concentrations in the stable fraction varied from 3.1 to 9.7 g kg-1, representing between 38 and 92 % of the total carbon, and this was the dominant fraction for most of the treatments.