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  • Amin Soltangheisi
    College of Agriculture Luiz de Queiroz
  • Ana Paula Bettoni Teles
    College of Agriculture Luiz de Queiroz
  • Marcos Rodrigues
    College of Agriculture Luiz de Queiroz
  • Wilfrand Ferney Bejarano Herrera
    University of Sao Paulo
  • Laércio Ricardo Sartor
    Universidade Tecnológica Federal do Paraná
  • Paul John Anthony Withers
    Lancaster University
  • Paulo Pavinato
    Universidade de São Paulo
Plants have developed different mechanisms to absorb and solubilize phosphorus (P) in the soil, especially in environments with low P availability. This study evaluated the effects of different winter cover crops on soil P availability in a clayey subtropical (Hapludox) soil receiving soluble P fertilizer and a rock phosphate applied to the summer crop, under no-tillage. The experiment was carried out over 3 yrs (2009–2011) with five different cover crop species: common vetch, fodder radish, ryegrass, black oat, white clover and fallow as control. The soil was sampled after the third year of cover crop cultivation and analysed for inorganic and organic P forms according to the well-established Hedley fractionation procedure. Phosphate fertilizers promoted accumulation of both labile and nonlabile P pools in soil in the near surface layer, especially under rock phosphate. Fertilizer applications were not able to change P fractions in deeper layers, emphasizing that the Brazilian clayey soils are a sink of P from fertilizer and its mobility is almost nil. Although the cover crops recycled a great amount of P in tissue, in a short-term evaluation (3 yrs) they only changed the content of moderately labile P in soil, indicating that long-term studies are needed for more conclusive results.
Original languageEnglish
JournalSoil Use and Management
Volume33
Issue number1
Early online date3 Feb 2017
Publication statusPublished - 1 Mar 2017
Externally publishedYes
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