Soil Exhaustion Criteria for Central Siberia

Abstract

The article presents the results of studying the influence of long-term agricultural use on the content of labile organic matter in arable soils. Some criteria are suggested for estimating the effective of fertility agrochernozems, black, grey and dark grey soils, the exhaustion degree and the environmental sustainability to anthropogenic loadings. For the comprehensive assessment of fertility of arable soils in Central Siberia it is recommended to use indicators of easily decomposed organic matter and mobile humic substances. The higher the content of these forms of organic matter, the more fertile and more ecologically sustainable to anthropogenic load soil is, and it can be used for agriculture for a long time. To assess the soil exhaustion degree it is used the relative content of labile organic matter, expressed as a percentage of the total content of soil organic matter.