Land capability and suitability assessment of some soils El-Galaba plain, Aswan, Egypt

Mohamed Rashed, I. A.; Faragallah, M. A.; El-Desoky, A. I.; Sayed, Y. A.

doi:10.21608/aasj.2022.272406

Land capability and suitability assessment of some soils El-Galaba plain, Aswan, Egypt

Document Type : Research article

Authors

Department of Soils and Water, Faculty of Agriculture, Al-Azhar University, Assiut 71524, Egypt

10.21608/aasj.2022.272406

Abstract

The objective of this work aims to study the land capability and suitability under drip and sprinkler irrigation systems of some soils located in El-Galaba plain, west of Edfu city, Aswan governorate, Egypt. The soil texture of the study area was mainly sand, loamy sand and sandy loam with different percentages of gravel content; they are deep soil profiles. Organic matter (OM) content is low and decrease with depth. EC_e values vary widely from 0.3 - 26.7 dS/m indicting that the studied soils are non-saline to moderately saline. Soil reaction (pH) is a strongly alkaline to very strongly alkaline as shown by pH values which ranged from 8.3 to 9.9. Calcium carbonate content ranged between 1 and 12%, while gypsum content ranged between 0.00 and 1.09%. Values of cation exchange capacity (CEC) ranged between 4 to 17 cmol (+)/kg. Most of studied soils are non-sodic, exchangeable sodium percentage (ESP) ranged between 7 and 23%. The land capability using the applied system of land evaluation (ASLE) program by Ismail and Morsi (2001) under drip irrigation system shows the result in the study area are good (C2), poor (C4), very poor (C5), and non-agricultural (C6), while, using ASLE program under sprinkler irrigation system were good (C2), poor (C4), and very poor (C5). Moreover, the microcomputer land evaluation information system (MicroLEIS- Cervatana model) was moderately (S3) and marginally (N1). On the other side, the land suitability using the applied system of land evaluation (ASLE) program under drip and sprinkler irrigation systems were highly suitable, suitable, moderately suitable, marginally suitable, and not suitable (currently suitable N1) for crops; wheat, cotton, sugar beet, maize, soya bean, tomato, cabbage, pepper, onion, alfalfa, date palm, olive, fig and grape. A web-based program the microcomputer land evaluation information system (MicroLEIS-Almagra model), was used to compute the land suitability indicated that the soils of the study area were moderately suitable, marginally suitable, and non-suitable for the selected crops. The major limitations of these soils were soil texture and low soil fertility.

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