Physical soil stability under different management of extensive pasture in haplumbrept soils

Abstract

In the dairy cattle production of the small region of São João Del Rei (MG - Brazil) it is common to manage extensive native pastures with annual fires on low natural fertility Haplumbrept soils. The objective of this work was to evaluate the physical stability by measuring the degree of clay flocculation of a Haplumbrept soil under different management systems of extensive pastures. The evaluations were done using three types of managements: native pasture without fire; native pasture with fire, and recovered pasture. For each treatment it was selected one “sub area” of 1 hectare, located at the middle hillside with declivity between 10 and 12%, where, in the month of June 2007, 50 randomized deformed soil samples were collected/studied, in the layer of 0-10 cm to evaluate the degree of clay flocculation, pH, DpH_H2O, pH_{KCl (1N)}, zero point charge (PCZ). The systems of soil management did influence the degree of clay flocculation, with the lowest values found in pasture with annual burning and recovered pasture. The recovery of pasture in this fragile soil requires care with physical and chemical soil management.