Potassium in soils under different cropping systems: 3. Non-exchangeable potassium in soils from long-term experiments at Rothamsted and Woburn

Abstract

SUMMARYSoils from long-term experiments at Rothamsted and Woburn were cropped for very long periods (up to 5½ years) with ryegrass in pots. Measurements of the potassium taken up by the ryegrass that was not exchangeable to ammonium acetate and the kinetics of its release both suggested two categories of non-exchangeable K. Of these, the first to be released was closely related to the initial exchangeable K, whilst the second, though partly related to the initial exchangeable K was also influenced by the clay percentage. Release of both categories may have been controlled by diffusion, because both showed good relationships between the quantity released and time. It is suggested that the first category may be K ‘trapped’ when K fertilizer added in the field decreased the interlamellar spaces of vermiculite layers in clay particles, whilst the second may simply be the ‘native’ K (described by others) present in clay and other minerals in the soil.Resowing the soils (without drying them) during the later stages of K. uptake suggested that the ability of the old ryegrass to absorb K was not a factor limiting K uptake even after long growth.When the ryegrass ceased to grow, the mean K potentials in the exhausted soils were close to the ‘uptake potential’ for ryegrass derived earlier by considering K uptakes from soils in relation to the quantity/potential relationships of the soils. Drying and rewetting the exhausted soils released K; the amount was influenced in one group of soils by the exchangeable K in the moist exhausted soil and in another group by the clay percentage.