Nusantara RW, Aspan A, Alhaddad AM, Suryadi UE, Makhrawie, Fitria I, Fakhrudin J, Rezekikasari. 2018. Peat soil quality index and its determinants as influenced by land use changes in Kubu Raya District, West Kalimantan, Indonesia. Biodiversitas 19: 535-540. Tropical peatland is continuously damaged in large area in Indonesia, caused by deep and wide drains which change the ecosystem. This research was conducted to evaluate the soil quality index (SQI) based on peatland use. The research was conducted in Kubu Raya District, West Kalimantan Province, in secondary peat forest, shrubland, oil palm plantation and corn field. The variables observed in this research were subsidence, water-table level, depth of peat, bulk density, water content, porosity, organic carbon, total nitrogen, total potassium, cation exchange capacity, base saturation, ash content, available phosphorus, and exchangeable calcium, magnesium, sodium, C/N ratio and soil acidity. The results showed that SQI in secondary peat forest, shrubland, corn field and palm oil plantation were 0.40, 0.37, 0.37 and 0.37 respectively. The stepwise regression analyses showed that the variables influencing SQI were the depth of peat, water-table level, and ash content. Secondary forest had the highest level (0.74) for the depth of peat with 509 cm depth while the other sites had average level (0.41-0.43) with 108.4 cm-115.5 cm mean depth. SQI of peatland increased with the increasing depth of peat and ash content. The differences showed that land use change of peatland, from forest to plantation area would decrease its SQI.
It is well-known that there are some problems faced in cultivating peat-land as an agricultural land. The main problems are related to both its low soil acidity and its high cation exchange capacity. Previous studies showed that coastal sediment has shown its potential to overcome these constraints. This experiment is design to invent new potential coastal sediment resource after the closeness of Pantai Kijing areas as the coastal sediment source, and to study some of important basic chemical properties of coastal sediment collected from new sites. The samples were collected from 10 selected sites in District of Sambas, and analyzed in the Laboratory of Soil Chemistry and Soil Fertility of Faculty of Agriculture, Tanjungpura University. For other two districts we used secondary data from previous studies. It was found that (1) District of Sambas could be the most next potential coastal sediment source after the closeness the area of Pantai Kijing, (2) High pH and BS values of coastal sediment from District of Sambas are two important properties needed to improve poor soil properties in West Kalimantan, and (3) high base element content could be further resource in improving properties of upland degrade soil in West Kalimantan. It is highly recommended to do more further basic experiments in order to optimize this new coastal sediment funtion as soil ameliorant.
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