Hydraulic conductivity
The hydraulic conductivity of the control and UN100 amended soils
was similar demonstrating that UN alone did not show any positive effects on soil hydraulic conductivity (Table 3). Application of organic or
organic–inorganic amendments significantly increased hydraulic conductivity
by 15 to 32% over the control and 10 to 27% over UN100 (averaged
over two sites). Our results are in consistence with the findings of
Saha et al. (2010) who reported that integrated use of FYM, biofertilizer
and limewithmineral fertilizer increased hydraulic conductivity by 8 to
39% compare to control and 2 to 29% over NPK fertilizer. The increase in
the hydraulic conductivity under organic and integrated treatmentswas
mainly attributed to decrease in BD and increase in the effective pore
volume (Flowers and Lal, 1998) or due to the improvement in soil structural
stability, increase in organic matter content and biological activity
of the soil (Bellakki et al., 1998). Under a field experiment conducted on
a Vertisol, hydraulic conductivity of the NPK + FYM amended soil was
significantly greater than NPK (35%) and control treatments (64%)