You cannot test all of soil properties. So your aim and your budget will determine what kind of data are useful for farmers and the state agriculture agency. I agree with Nimmy Jose Jose. You should review actual and present available soil and farming information.

At first glance; pH, organic matter, clay and sand content, electrical conductivity, macro and micro elements content of soils should be used in the soil health system.

In India, Kerala state, the Kerala Agricultural University, Rice Research Station, Moncompu  is associated with the analysis of the soil for issuing soil health cards to the farmers. Based on the agro-ecological zones, the uplands as well as the low lands were included in the scheme. Each and every farmer will be issued a soil health card with all his personal identification details. Details of soil collection, cropping pattern and soil nutrient status of major and secondary nutirents. It is better to include the micro nutrients also as deficiency symptoms are always been reported in continuous cropping system.  we have also developed soil maps for different agro ecological zones. 

Thanks Dear Nimmy ji, Actually I want to know the all possible and handy collection of information. thanks for your detailed answer. regards

You cannot test all of soil properties. So your aim and your budget will determine what kind of data are useful for farmers and the state agriculture agency. I agree with Nimmy Jose Jose. You should review actual and present available soil and farming information.

At first glance; pH, organic matter, clay and sand content, electrical conductivity, macro and micro elements content of soils should be used in the soil health system.

It actually widely varies. No consensus so far...

Thanks @Hidayet Karakurt, yes we cannot go for all parameters but we are trying to make consensus for that we are pondering as @Debashish mentioned which has no consensus so far. Thanks to you both for replying. Regards

Soil health can be determined by the following parameters:

1. Good moisture content of the soil. 4.

2. Soil temperarure ( moderate

As most respondents have rightly pointed out, the purpose of the study will go a long way in determining the parameters of interest. Also, even within the purpose of the study, while it may be desirable to determine as much of the parameters as is possible, financial and time constraints may not permit.

My dear @Partha Pratim Chakravorty  Thanks for your valuable answer and suggestions but we are looking for the minimum parameters to be analyzed.

Dear @Glory Enaruvbe the purpose of study is to determine present soil health at the moment at farmers fields. Since it is going to be in big way and millions and millions samples will be collected and analyzed. Since such an huge exercise is being undertaken on National level I want to add few more parameters suggested by scientific community may be added to take additional benefits of this scheme and also use this data for further advanced planning in coming future. Regards

Since you have not mentioned any parameters, I would recommend that you analyse for all physical parameters including soil morphological characteristics by sinking profile pits with the intent to correctly classify the soil types and nutrient status of the soil in different parts of the country using the methods of  FAO, 2006. Similarly, it would be important to analyse for chemical nutrients in the soil such as all macro and micro nutrients. The micro nutrients influence several plant growth parameters. Therefore, examining these nutrients could offer insight into the nature of the soil and how it could impact plant growth and development. 

Thanks to see diversity of answers which is expected with variety of experts. As an ecologist I have simple submission:

Conventional analyses of soil and soil mapping has been done profusely throughout the globe. If that is sufficient enough why this exercise for soil health mapping? We know the gap between conventional scientist's understanding and local farmer's professional knowledge application. The soil health should consider parameters which the farmer can monitor by him/herself and go for mapping with least help from the Chairman scientists.  Agriculture should be away from 'agreement' culture and spelling should be rectified as 'agree-culture' where the farmer's need, market demand, socio-cultural and economic conditions, bio-climatic limits, soil status and local resources should be agreeable, 

My view will be to look into two most important parameters: (i) diversity of carbon, and (ii) diversity of large biota (>2mm).  The methods should be inexpensive and should be practical to the farmer's household materials with minimum dependence. The basis is that both organic matter and biota indicate spectrum of characteristic features of soil which are interacting, interdependent and integrated. Both these parameters are linked to the 'soul of the soil'.

Soil health card should not aim for only large commercial farmers but for marginal farmers, who are "son of the soil". This is the reason why I have raised the two issues of organic and organismic diversity relating to these son of the soil but not the commercial exploiter of soil.

There should also be accountability of the of the dept./ scientists who are involved for the cause of the common man and should be free from academic exercise of publications and publicity.

Three publications are attached for reference.

All the best,

B. K. Senapati

If this is a nationally funded project I suggest using measures that are mainstream so that you have some international basis for comparison.  These would include:  EC;  pH in water and a salt solution such as 10 mM CaCl2 or 1 M KCl; at least one  measure of "available P", such as Olsen and/or Bray; exchangeable cations including Al of the pH in 10 mM CaCl2 < 5.2 (strongly acidic);  for strongly acidic soils consider a measure of lime requirement;  OM; extractable trace metals using e.g. DTPA or EDTA; and hot water soluble B. 

Plant tissue testing is a more reliable index of the adequacy of supply of B, S and the trace metals.  There are large tabulations of good quality reference data for different crops.

Thanks Dear Paul Milham, for such an wonderful suggestions. I do agree with you. This is a Nationally funded scheme. Thanks

In West Bengal, this scheme has been running since last 7-8 years. I am also attached with this scheme since from its inception. Till now more than one lakhs Soil Health Card Distributed among the farmers. At present SHC includes Soil Type, pH, EC, organic carbon, available phosphate, available potassium, available Sulphur, CEC, available Fe, Mn, Zn, Cu, B and Mo etc. There is also provision of testing irrigation water. I think these are enough to serve our purpose in future. Some parameter may be included like soil bio mass, but it will be near impossible to test these parameter for all the samples. These data will be utilized in bigger research purpose in future, if instead of plot no. longitude and latitude no of the plot incorporated in the information part.

As Tapan Kumar Garai suggested some parameters like Soil Type, pH, EC, organic carbon, available phosphate, available potassium, available Sulphur, CEC, available Fe, Mn, Zn, Cu, B and Mo are really most important parameters needs to analyze in SHC scheme. One more important parameter is here which may need to analyze for characterize soil health i.e., soil enzymatic activity analysis. The soil enzymatic activity is a good indicator for soil health.

Excellent and practical question Dr. Dubey

Indeed evaluation of soil health (or soil quality) is a beneficial tool for sustainable soil management. There are 4 types of indices for this purpose: visual signs (such as erosion rills, yellowing of the leaves, etc.), soil physical parameters (such as water holding capacity, texture, structure, etc), soil chemical properties (such as EC, pH, CEC, etc) and soil biological properties (such as respiration, earthworm population, respiration, etc.). There are hundreds of parameters to choose from. However, the minimum data set or the appropriate selection of the parameters depends on: climate of the location, who is going to use the health card, time and budget, specific problems in an area, the ease of measurement techniques, availability of equipments... A good soil health card, should consider all 4 groups of parameters mentioned above, to get an overall view of the soil health condition of the field. Organic matter is an excellent parameter and in my opinion is a must, since it affects soil physical, chemical and biological properties. However it is not enough and some other parameters from each categories should also be included. So the minimum number really depends on your purpose (agronomic, environmental, engineering, ... ) and local conditions (climate, agronomic problems, major soil problems, i.e. salinity, acidity, etc.). However, soil quality (or soil health) evaluations by scientists, usually 5-6 parameters from all categories mentioned above, are chosen.

There is a very critical and important point that i should make. The main purpose of Soil Health cards is to be used by FARMERS in their own field to evaluate the health (or quality) of their soil, and see what positive or negative effects their agronomic practices and field management decisions have on the health and thus, productivity of their soil. This is not intended to be used by the scientists, who have access to elaborate laboratories, equipments and techniques. Considering this, minimum of appropriate parameters should be chosen from each category and put in the soil health card, that are FARMER FRIENDLY. That is they can easily learn the measurement techniques, use home made equipments or very easily available equipments around them, do it in a relatively short time (1 hour or less) so they will be willing to repeat it at least 2 times a year. For example a simple Coffee Can may be used for evaluation of soil water infiltration. A simple iron rod can be used to evaluate for signs of compaction in soil, and so on.

My favorite soil health card schemes that are Farmer Friendly, even for my country, are the ones below. I hope they will be useful to you.

Soil Quality Institute. 1999. Soil Quality Test Kit Guide. NRCS, ARS-USDA. http://soils.usda.gov/sqi/assessment/files/test_kit_complete.pdf

Tuckombil Landcare Inc. 2002. Northern Rivers Soil Health Card. http://www.dpi.nsw.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0007/168703/northern-rivers-soil-health-card.pdf

Thanks Tapan Kumar ji for such an detailed reply. Yes it is really difficult and almost impossible to analyze soil biomass in each and every soil sample. But of course is an import parameter. Thanks for summerising all the parameters and sharing wonderful long experience with the scheme. Regards.

Dear Sandeep ji of course soil enzymatic activity is a good indicator of soil health. Thanks for your suggestion it may also be included..Appreciable. Thanks

@ Farhad Khorsandi, Many Thanks for such a wonderful elustrated discussion on such an important issue. I appreciate from core of my heart and that king for providing such nice links related to the scheme. Thank you again. Regards.

Interesting questions.Difficult to arrive at  minimum  soil data(MSD) to be included in Soil Health Card (SHC).It needed a serious soil research because the answers can not be very straightforward for soils of India under tropical environments. However some research attempts  are made for soils of the IGP and black soils under NAIP in the  recent past to raise this issue in a more logical manner and the results are published in Current Science. Two pdfs are attached for your perusal and further debate and research.

Respected @Dr. Dilip. Kumar Pal Ji, thanks for sending such an wonderful articles and also for interesting discussion. Regards

respected sir, i do agree with all the above discussions but my only suggestion is what ever parameters among  physical,chemical & biological will be finalized for SHC,they should be those which could be easily& practicably feasible for analytical determination in soil testing labs. Because no. of samples would be huge and some procedures of determining soil physical,chemical and biological parameters are quite cumbersome. Secondly , there is also need to keep in view facilities of instruments,their working condition, available technical staff in soil testing laboratories all over country.because as said that the main purpose of Soil Health cards is to be used by farmers to know soil health.

I fully agree with Dear Gayatri about the lack of facilities in our soil laboratories including trained manpower. This is more so when we have identified minimum data set for that are yield  reducing factors in soils of the IGP and black soils areas. It is not an easy job anyway and thus requires adequate scientific attention and governance.

Thanks @Dr. Gayatri Verma ·and @Dr.Dilip. Kumar Pal  Sir, Yes it is true that not only scientific man power  but instruments conditions are also a major problem at present in Indian condition. I totally agree with the comments of yours, that is why we want to prepare the list of minimum possible parameters for different soil and ecological conditions. Thanks for your valuable inputs. Regards

Here is a current weblink address for the NRCS Soil Quality Card Design Guide refernced above by Farhad Korsandhi:

http://www.nrcs.usda.gov/Internet/FSE_DOCUMENTS/nrcs142p2_053165.pdf

There are many other very informative references to be found here in the Soil Health section of the NRCS website.

Here is a link to a Soil Quality Card that we had used in Alberta, Canada:   http://www1.agric.gov.ab.ca/$department/deptdocs.nsf/all/sag6953

Here is a link to our Soil Quality page which includes the link to the SQ Card as well as evalluation of field tests, our monitoring program, etc:  www.agric.gov.ab.ca/soilquality

A link to a review of Soil Quality Indicators done 10 years ago that may have key references that are still pertinent:  http://www1.agric.gov.ab.ca/$department/deptdocs.nsf/all/aesa8681

The one test that is the best indicator of the labile organic fraction is the popularly-named Haney test, or the USDA-ARS Soil Health Tool Model which uses for the most part commonly available materials and methods. Here is a recent webinar that explains this battery of tests:

http://www.conservationwebinars.net/webinars/soil-health-and-new-soil-testing-methods/

Attached is a study from Maine that validates the model and also this.

Initial Field Evaluation of the Agro-Economic Effects of Determining Nitrogen Fertilizer Rates with a Recently-Developed Soil Test Methodology, R. Daren Harmel*, Richard L. Haney, Open Journal of Soil Science, 2013, 3, 91-99

Labile organic C or water soluble SOC may be taken as one of the dataset for SHC for soils of higher preciipitation geographical areas.But it does  not work well in soils of SAT environments where saturated hydraulic conductivity works  much better.

@Recheard Dale, thanks for your comments and links which are very useful. Regards

Hi friend @ T. W. Goddard, Thanks for the soil card from Alberta Canada and also for the important link too. I appreciate your response. Regards

Hi Respected Dr DK Pal ji, Yes Sir, Labile organic C or water soluble SOC are also very important parameters and may also be included in soil health card data set in high infernal areas. Thanks for your wise suggestion Sir. Regards

Dear Dr.Dubey,after rreviewing the health cards of several states IISS,Bhopal has prea

Dear Sir, @ Dr A Subba Rao, Your complete answer is not attached. It seems some portion has left. Can you send it again please. Regards

Dear Dr. Dubey I prepared my answer but it failed while uploading.Based on inputs

from several state soil testing  laboratories,IISS,Bhopal has compiled and moderated the soil health card. The same  was printed and circulated to different states.The health card includes soil physical(colour,depth,texture,bulk density and total porosity),chemical(pH,Ec,Available N,P,K,S,Fe,Zn,Cu,Mn,B) and  biological(organic carbon and earthworm population).There is scope to develop rapid methods especially for biological parameters like labile organi carbon and dehydrogenase activity. Also the minimum data set can not be uniform for all soils. So there is need to identify minimum  soil health indicator parameters based on research publications made so for on indian soils, based on statistical analysis and expert opinion .

Last two sentences of Dr. Subba Rao's statements  are need to be taken care of.

Thanks @Dr Subba Rao and @Dr DK Pal ji for your detailed and elaborated inputs. Of course parameters can not be same for all soil types. They will be modified as per site specificity. Thanks for your suggestions. Regards