Assessment of some Physical and Chemical Properties of Soils in West Edfu Area, Aswan Governorate, Egypt

Abstract

The soils in west Edfu are promising for land reclamation projects due to their location nearby the urban areas and availability of groundwater resources for crop irrigation. The objectives of this work were to evaluate of some physical and chemical properties of west Edfu soils which are located in the western part of the Aswan Governorate. The obtained results indicated that the majority of soils in the area under study is sandy textured, which had a very significant impact on their physical and chemical properties. The values of saturation percentage (SP) and soil porosity (E) are low, whereas the values of bulk density (ρ b) were high especially in the western part of the study area. Electrical conductivity (ECe) values of the saturated soil past extracts in general vary between 1.29 to 61.29 dsm-1 with an average of 11.94 dS/m. The pH values of all studied soils are generally above 7.00 with a range of 7.12 to 8.95 and an average value of 7.76. On the other hand, the cations exchange capacity (CEC) values were low in most of the studied soils and it is ranges from 1.38 to 45.84 cmol (+) /kg with a mean value of 11.15 cmol (+) /kg. In the area under study the ESP values vary between 0.59 to 40.55% with an average value of 16.39%, CaCO 3 in the studied soils ranges from 0.43 to 41.74% with a mean value of 7.23%. Gypsum content varies from 0.09 to 11.53% with an average value of 3.08%. In general, the dominance of salt composition in soils is Na 2 CO 3 and CaCO 3 and sometimes MgCO 3 in sodic soils. The cationic composition of the soil is dominated by Na + followed by Ca +2 and then Mg +2 and K +. Exceptional cases were found in some soil samples Ca +2 exceed Na +. The anionic composition is characterized by the dominance of Clfollowed by HCO 3 then SO 4-2 while CO 3-2 in entirely absent. The results also indicate that the soluble cations and anions are very wide in range and distribution among the different locations.