Organic and inorganic phosphorus in Mollisol soil under different tillage practices

The distribution of soil phosphorus (P) between different organic and inorganic forms depends on, among other factors, the tillage systems. The evaluation of soil P fractions is essential to determine if they are related to available P. The objective was to characterize the P forms from a soil under no tillage (NT) and conventional tillage (CT). Soil samples were taken at 0–5, 5–10 and 10–20 cm depth from a fine, mixed, thermic Petrocalcic Paleoudoll, after 8 years under NT and CT. Inorganic and organic P was measured in the anion exchange membrane (AEM), NaHCO3, NaOH, NaOH after sonication, HCl and residual fractions extracted sequentially. Microbial P was determined by fumigating with chloroform after P extraction with AEM. The tillage systems did not affect the total P content but the distribution of P among fractions changed between NT and CT. No tillage system had significantly higher microbial P at all soil depths and ranged from 34 mg P kg−1 at 0–5 cm to 10 mg P kg−1 at 10–20 cm. In the upper 10 cm of soil, NT tended to have higher AEM-Pi and NaHCO3-Pi comparing to CT system. The increase in AEM-Pi was closely related to organic carbon increases and pH decreases. The was a consistently higher concentration of NaOH-Po but the increase was significant al 5–10 and 10–20 cm, and represented on average about 35% of total P. The residual P which was considered mostly organic was also an important pool in both NT and CT, and accounted for about 30% of total P. Therefore, P availability is mainly controlled by organic P which makes up a larger proportion of total P.