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Asian Journal of Applied Sciences

Year: 2013 | Volume: 6 | Issue: 2 | Page No.: 68-78
DOI: 10.3923/ajaps.2013.68.78
Spatial Variability Analysis of Soil Properties using Raster based GIS Techniques
Saravanan Sivarajan, M. Nagarajan and R. Sivasamy

Abstract: The spatial variability studies performed to see the varying effect of soil properties across the fields and to make efficient crop management decisions in the future. The goal of this study was to determine spatial variability of selected soil properties that influences crop growth and its crop yields. The study was conducted in an agricultural field Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu, India. The data collected were analyzed using geostatistics tool with semivariograms, kriging and classical statistics that involved mean, range, standard deviation and coefficient of variation. The statistical analysis showed a high variability for soil pH having a Cv of 11.88%. The parameters such as infiltration, porosity, Field Capacity (FC), Wilting Point (WP) and phosphorus showed considerable variability with a coefficient of variation between 5 and 9% and least variability was found to exist for electrical conductivity (EC), available potassium (K), available nitrogen (N) and Bulk Density (BD) with Cv of 0.037, 0.29, 0.62 and 2.01, respectively. The semivariograms were calculated for the study area with a sampling distance of 5 m and the N, P, K and EC were linear with sill models and each showed a considerable range of spatial dependence measuring a distance between 10 and 25 m. The kriged surface was created for all the soil properties with the exception of BD, porosity and WP as these parameters were found to be spatially uncorrelated. These spatial variations in soil properties in the field may arise from management activities or due to soil textural effects.

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How to cite this article
Saravanan Sivarajan, M. Nagarajan and R. Sivasamy, 2013. Spatial Variability Analysis of Soil Properties using Raster based GIS Techniques. Asian Journal of Applied Sciences, 6: 68-78.

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