Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-g7gxr Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-03T00:33:54.631Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Nitrification in Egyptian Soils

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 March 2009

James Arthur Prescott
Affiliation:
Sultanieh Agricultural Society, Cairo, Egypt.

Extract

An attempt has been made to determine the intensity of the biological processes in the soil during the most important periods of the Egyptian farm rotation. The fluctuations of the nitrate content in the surface soil have been taken as the most important index of this activity.

In all cases the moisture content of the soil limited these processes more than any other factor.

There was observed throughout the season in a cotton field a relatively large amount of nitrate, more than sufficient for the immediate needs of the cotton plant. The lack of response on the part of the Egyptian cotton crop to nitrogenous fertilisers may be accounted for in part, if not entirely, by the fact that nitrification in the soil is well ahead of the needs of the crop.

Nitrification under wheat and maize shows in general the same characteristics in Egypt as in other parts of the world; there is no accumulation of nitrate in the soil.

The winter fallow, depending for its water on the rainfall, may be a period of steady nitrification when the amount of the rainfall is sufficiently high.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1919

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

page 216 note 1 Comptes Renducs, 1909, 148, 725Google Scholar.

page 216 note 2 Bulletin de l' Institut Egyptien, Dec. 1907.

page 218 note 1 Phil. Trans. 1917, B. 208, 157.Google Scholar

page 218 note 2 E.g. Hughes, F., “Report on the manurial trials on Cotton carried out during the season 1908,” Yearbook Khedivial Agric. Soc., 1909, 154.Google Scholar

Hughes, F. and Jefferys, H. C., “Manurial trials on Cotton carried out in the Stata Domains, 1910,” Agric. Journal Egypt, 1912, 1, 8.Google Scholar

Mosseri, V. M., “Note préliminaire sur les Engrais Chimiques dans la culture du cotonnier en Egypte,” Trans. 3rd International Congress of Tropical Agriculture, London, 1914.Google Scholar

page 220 note 1 See for example: Russell, E. J., This Journal, 1914, 6, 18Google Scholar; Russell, E. J. and Appleyard, A., This Journal, 1915, 7, 1Google Scholar; Russell, E. J. and Appleyard, A., This Journal, 1917, 8, 385.Google Scholar

page 220 note 2 See also Mosseri, V. M., “Note préliminaire sur les sels nuisibles et le cotonnier en Egypte,” Trans. 3rd International Congress of Tropical Agriculture, London, 1914.Google Scholar

page 224 note 1 This Journal, 8, 403.Google Scholar

page 226 note 1 Mackenzie, W. C. and Foaden, G. P., Manures in Egypt and Soil Exhaustion, Cairo, 1896.Google Scholar

page 227 note 1 This Journal, 1913, 5, 469.Google Scholar

page 233 note 1 This Journal, 1913, 5, 152.Google Scholar

page 234 note 1 Journ. Franklin Inst., 1911, Jan.