Determination of Micronutrients Concentration in Tea Cultivated Soil in Dibrugarh and Sivasagar Districts of Assam, India

Abstract

A study of the micronutrient status of soils of two upper Assam districts of Dibrugarh and Sivasagar was made at 60 different locations. The objective of the experiment was to study the status of micronutrients after continuous tea cultivation and their relationship with various physiochemical properties. Soil samples were collected at the three depths of 0-15, 15-30 and 30-60 cm and analyzed for Copper, Iron, Manganese, Zinc and hot water soluble Boron. The Copper, Iron, Manganese, Zinc and Boron ranged from 16.73-36.33 mg/kg (average 26.53), 15.35-31.73 mg/kg (average 23.54), 13.17-29.13 mg/kg (average 21.15); 49.3-107.7 mg/kg (average 78.5), 44.1-99.6 mg/kg (average 71.9), 32.1-85.3 mg/kg (average 58.7); 118.53- 420.53 mg/kg (average 269.53), 103.73-390.33 mg/kg (average 247.03), 92.07-377.50 mg/kg (average 234.79); 21.43-65.20 mg/kg (average 43.32), 21.07-56.47 mg/kg (average 38.77), 17.70-48.87 mg/kg (average 33.29); 3.09-3.97 mg/kg (average 3.53), 2.76-3.67 mg/kg(average 3.22), 2.41-3.27 mg/kg (average 2.84) for the surface , subsurface (I) and subsurface (II) soil respectively. All the micronutrients gave positive significant correlation with soil pH and organic matter and gave negative significantly correlated with clay content. Other physiochemical properties of soil showed either negative or positive non-significant correlation with micronutrient during the study.