Journal of Rangeland

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Inappropriate land use changes have negative effects on desirable physical and chemical properties of soil. The purpose of this study is assessing the effect of different land uses changes on physical and chemical properties of soil in Eshtehard region. After determining land uses including monoculture, multiple cropping, garden, rangeland, abandoned and salty land, soil samples were taken from two depths of 0-30 and 30-60 cm in three repetitions for all land uses and totally 36 samples were transferred to the laboratory. Soil texture, bulk and particle density, phosphorus, electrical conductivity, organic matter and potassium of all samples were measured. Data were analyzed using Duncan multiple range test in SPSS software. Maps of land uses were gained for years 2000, 2008 and 2015 using Landsat satellite imagery and maximum livelihood method in ENVI software. The results showed that monoculture and multiple cropping lands have decreased about 9.7 and 7.16 Km2 respectively from 2000 to 2015 while rangeland, salty land and abandoned lands have increased 2.07, 3.01 and 6.43 Km2 respectively. Land use change has increased bulk and particle density and amount of sand in surface layer. In addition, bulk density has increased 1.6% and amount of sand has decreased 3.5% at deeper depth. The highest amount of silt, clay and sand was observed in abandoned land, rangeland and garden area respectively. The highest and lowest amounts of porosity were related to rangeland (45.83%) and abandoned land (34.61%). The highest amount of phosphorus and organic matter, 0.843 and 0.120 respectively, was related to rangeland and the lowest amount of them, 3.243 and 1.306 respectively, was related to abandoned land. The reduction of potassium and organic matter was 0.712 and 0.042 respectively in deep layer. According to the results, during 2000 to 2015, many agricultural lands have changed to abandoned lands, rangelands, garden areas and salty lands, leading to changes in soil characteristics. Multiple cropping lands and rangelands were the most desirable land uses and abandoned and salty lands were the most undesirable land uses.

Keywords: Surface layer, Subsurface layer, Multicultural, Duncan test, SPSS

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