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World Applied Sciences Journal 25 (11): 1519-1524, 2013
ISSN 1818-4952
© IDOSI Publications, 2013
DOI: 10.5829/idosi.wasj.2013.25.11.13452
Status of Zn Availability in Soils and Evaluation the Efficiency of
Some Wheat Cultivars under Stress Condition of Zinc Deficiency
1
O.A. Nofal, 2A.I. Rezk and 2A.B. El-Nasharty
Plant Nutrition Department, National Research Centre, Dokki, Giza, Egypt
Fertilization Technology Department, National Research Centre, Dokki, Giza, Egypt
1
2
Submitted: Sep 25, 2013;
Accepted: Nov 1, 2013;
Published: Nov 6, 2013
Abstract: Samples of the upper soil layer (0-30 cm) of seven villages from Banger El-Sokker Region, west
Alexandria, Egypt, were collected during winter of 2012/2013 season to evaluate the status of DTPA-extractable
Zn. In addition, pot experiment was carried out to assess Zn supply from soils to three wheat
(Triticum aestivum L.) cultivars: Sakha-93, Gemiza-7 and Giza-168 grown in sandy calcareous soils differing in
DTPA-Zn. The concentrations of DTPA-extractable Zn from soils varied from 0.07 to 1.94 with an average of
0.66 mg/kg soil. The investigated soils samples (180) were categorized into three groups with respect to
DTPA-Zn as Zn-deficient which soils (<0.5 mg Zn/kg), Zn-sufficient soils (0.5-1.0 mg/kg) and Zn-high soils
(> 1.0 mg/kg), which were 42.8, 34.4 and 22.8% of total number of samples, respectively. Data of correlation
coefficient revealed significant positive relation between DTPA-Zn and both clay content (r = 0.55) and organic
matter content (r = 0.64) and negative relation with total carbonate (r = - 0.16). There is no evident relation
between DTPA-Zn and either sand or silt contents in soils. Data of pot experiment showed that the dry weights
of shoots of the three wheat cultivars grown in Zn-sufficient soil were higher than those grown in Zn deficient
soil. Sakha-93 wheat cultivar showed almost higher response to Zn-deficient soil than Gemiza-7 and Giza-168.
The relative increases, with reference to Zn-deficient soil, were 3.3 times higher for shoots of Sakha-93 when
grown in Zn-sufficient soil. Zinc concentrations and uptake in shoots were higher in shoots of Sakha-93 than
in those of Gemiza-7 and Giza-168. In addition, the Zinc utilization efficiency (Zn UtEshoot) by Sakha-93 was more
by 21% than that by Giza-168 when grown in Zn-deficient soil. These results revealed higher response of
Sakha-93 wheat variety to the original Zn of calcareous soil than Giza-168. This suggests a recommendation of
cultivating Sakha-93 wheat variety in calcareous soils of Banger El-Sokker region rather than Giza-168.
Key words: Cultivars
Wheat (Triticum aestivum L.)
INTRODUCTION
Zinc deficiency is most common in soils of the arid
regions especially those characterized with high calcium
carbonate and low Zn contents [1-3]. It is widespread in
soil types with high pH (pH > 6) and low organic matter
content. Several studies suggested different values of
the critical Zn level in soils using DTPA-soil test [1].
This could be due to variations in the types and
physicochemical nature of the tested soils. Lindsay and
Norvell [1] and Kalayci et al. [4] reported value of critical
level of Zn in soil of 0.5 mg/kg. However, Ekiz et al. [5]
considered a value of 0.1 mg Zn/kg is a critical level in
Pot experiment
Zinc deficiency
calcareous soil for wheat plant. Cakmak et al. [6] reported
that calcareous soil containing DTPA-extractable Zn
less than 0.09 mg/kg is Zn-deficient soil for wheat plant.
The reported value of critical levels of Zn in wheat plant
were mostly variable, depending on plant variety, growth
stage and plant organ. Jones [7] reported a value of 15
mg/kg DW, while, Alloway [8] and Marschner [9] reported
a value of 14.5 mg/kg DW in pre-flowering plant top.
The objectives of this study therefore were to
evaluate (i) the status of available Zn in soils of Banger
El-Sokkar region as extracted by DTPA method and (ii) the
efficiency of some wheat cultivars under stress condition
of zinc deficiency.
Corresponding Author: Abdel Halim I. Rezk, Fertilization Technology Department,
National Research Centre, Dokki, Giza, Egypt.
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World Appl. Sci. J., 25 (11): 1519-1524, 2013
MATERIALS AND METHODS
Zn uptake (total amount of Zn in shoot mg /plant) =
Shoot DW (g/plant) x Zn concentration (mg/kg)
Soil Sampling: The studied soils were collected from
Banger El-Sokker Region, 70 Km west of Alexandria city,
Egypt (located between the latitudes 30.45° and 31.00°
and longitudes 30.00° and 30.45°) during 2012/2013
season. One hundred and eighty composite soil sample
(0-30cm) were collected where each sample represented an
area of 6 fedddan (one feddan= 0.42 ha). The cultivated
crop, during soil sampling was corn at the tasseling stage.
These samples were air-dried, ground in a wooden mortar,
passed through 2mm sieve and stored in plastic bags for
analysis.
Zinc use efficiency (Zn UE) g DM/mg Zn applied = g of
DM pot / mg Zn applied per pot
Zn utilization efficiency (Zn UtE) g DM /mg Zn uptake= g
of DM per plant / mg Zn [6, 15].
Statistical Analysis: The data were statistically analyzed
for least significant difference using PC-SAS software
[16].
Soil Analysis: The soils were analyzed for the
determination of the electrical conductivity in 1:2.5
soil-water extract by conductivity meter, the pH in 1:2.5
soil-water suspension using pH meter, total calcium
carbonate by calcimeter, organic matter by Walkely and
Black [10]. The particle size distribution (sand, silt and
clay) was measured by hydrometer method [11]. The data
obtained were statistically analyzed as described by
Snedecor and Cochran [12].
Pot Experiment: Pot experiment was carried out in the
greenhouse of Faculty of Agriculture at Alexandria
University to evaluate the growth and Zn contents of
wheat grown on soils differing in Zn status. Three wheat
(Triticum aestivum L.) cultivars: Sakha-93, Gemiza-7 and
Giza-168, were used as test plants and two calcareous
soils deferring in Zn status deficient (0.07 mg/kg) and
sufficient (0.55 mg/kg) were used to evaluate their Zn
efficiency of some wheat cultivars. Grains of the three
wheat cultivars were sown in plastic pot (15 cm diameter
and 20 cm height) containing 2 kg soil in November 20.
The pots were irrigated every two days with Zn-free
half strength nutrient solution according to Hewitt [13].
The wheat seedling was thinned to six seedlings per pot
after one week from planting. After 45 days from planting,
the shoots and roots were collected, washed with tap
water then by distilled water and oven-dried at 65°C for 48
hours [14]. The oven-dried plant materials were weighted,
ground using stainless steel mill. Half gram oven-dried
plant material was ashed at 500°C for 6 hours, the ashed
residue was dissolved in 2N nitric acid and the
concentration of Zn was measured by Atomic Absorption
Spectrometer model GBC 932. Zn uptake, Zinc use
efficiency and Zn utilization efficiency were calculated as
follow:
RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS
The soils of Banger El-Sokkar region are
calcareous soils and belong to the order:
calciorthids. This region has been cultivated for
about 30 years with several crops and the source of
irrigation water is El-Naser canal. As shown in
Table 1, the soils have a pH ranged from 7.7 to 8.1, EC
from 0.7 to 2.1 dS/m, total CaCO 3 from 21.9 to 33.2%.
The particle size distribution widely varied and
ranged from 26.3 to 37.3% for clay, from 13.3 to 57.3%
for silt and from 9.8 to 58.0% for sand. These wide
variations of the chemical and physical characters
could be due to land level operations and agricultural
practices and management [17]. These soils belong to the
subgroup Typic Torriothents and the total carbonate is
greater than 30% mostly in powdery form [17]. The
variation in total carbonate content in soils could be
mostly attributed to differences in relief, treatments and
managements practices. This point out that cultivating
Banger El-Sokkar soil had increased the amounts of
organic matter and decreased slightly calcium carbonate
contents in soils [18].
DTPA-Extractable Zinc: Table 2 showed that the amount
of DTPA-extractable zinc from soils of Banger El-Sokker
region varied from 0.07 to 1.94 with a mean value of 0.66
mg Zn/kg soil. According to DTPA-Zn categories in soils
which indicated that Zn- deficient soils contain <0.5
mg/kg and Zn-sufficient soils contain from 0.5 -1.0 mg/kg
and Zn-high soils contain >1.0 mg/kg [19], the
investigated soils can be grouped as follow: 42.8%, 34.4%
and 22.8% of the total number of soils are Zn deficient, Zn
sufficient and Zn high soils, respectively. Several studies
were carried out to investigate Zn status, as extracted with
DTPA, in calcareous soils at the western area of Nile
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World Appl. Sci. J., 25 (11): 1519-1524, 2013
Table 1: The average values of the main chemical and physical properties of soils of villages of Banger El-Sokkar region.
Particle size distribution
----------------------------------------------------Village
Number of samples
pH
EC dS/m
CaCO 3%
O.M%
Sand
Silt
Clay
Nooh
12
8.1±0.1
1.9±2.1
21.9±3.9
0.7±0.3
27.5±14.1
46.2±12.9
26.3±6.6
Ayoub
17
8.0±0.1
1.7±0.6
26.5±4.1
0.6±0.2
55.8±8.8
13.3±3.5
30.9±6.7
Yahia
31
7.8±0.1
1.1±0.7
24.9±3.9
0.6±0.2
58.0±6.0
15.1±1.9
26.9±5.4
EL-Ola
29
7.9±0.1
0.7±0.4
33.2±7.1
0.5±0.3
46.0±8.2
16.7±2.5
37.3±7.2
Salama Hegazi
30
7.9±0.1
0.8±0.4
26.8±5.2
0.6±0.2
10.0±2.5
56.6±3.8
33.4±3.5
Mohammed Faried
31
7.7±0.2
2.0±1.5
25.4±3.0
0.4±0.2
13.6±2.9
57.3±3.3
29.2±4.1
El-Wehda El-Watania
30
7.7±0.1
2.1±1.7
27.7±4.9
0.4±0.1
9.8±5.0
56.8±4.0
33.4±4.3
Table 2: The amounts of DTPA-extractable Zn (mg/kg) from soils of the seven villages of Banger El-Sokkar region.
Village
Number of soil samples
Range
Average
Nooh
12
0.70 - 1.69
0.70
Ayuob
17
0.11 – 1.22
0.66
Yahia
31
0.21 – 1.94
0.94
El-Ola
29
0.09 – 1.29
0.40
Salama Hegazy
30
0.34 – 1.65
0.81
Mohamed Faried
31
0.07 – 1.76
0.46
El-Wehda El-Watania
30
0.07 – 1.08
0.59
Zn-DTPA (mg Zn/kg soli)
2.5
Zn-deficient% of total
67.7
35.9
19.4
79.0
26.7
74.2
40.0
y = 0.0110X + 0.953
r = - 0.16
2
1.5
1
0.5
0
15
20
25
30
35
40
45
50
CaCO3 %
Fig. 1: The relationship between the amount of DTPA-extractable Zn and total calcium carbonate in soils of Banger ElSokkar region.
Delta. Abdel-Mottaleb et al.[20] reported a range from 1.2
to 3.0 mg/kg DTPA-Zn in the upper soil layer (0-30) in
calcareous soils of Borg El Arab at the northwestern
coastal area of Egypt, while, Hafez et al. [21] found
DTPA-Zn in these soils ranged between 2.6 and 3.8 mg/kg
soil. Shahin et al. [22] found that the amount of DTPA-Zn
in calciorthids calcareous soils varied from 0.4 to 1.4 with
a mean value of 0.8 mg/kg soil. It is evident from Table 2
that the amounts of DTPA-extractable Zn from soils of
Banger El-Sokker region are close to those reported in the
literatures. However, there are wide variations among
value of the amounts of DTPA-extractable Zn from
calcareous soils, in general and this could be attributed to
sampling and preparation processes of soils for chemical
analysis. Tolay et al. [23] suggested that these variations
may be due to differences in the physical and chemical
characteristics of soils and agricultural management
practices. The occurrence of low levels of DTPA-Zn
(0.07 mg/kg soil) in some soils of Banger El-Sokker region
is due mainly to the low Zn content in parent rocks, which
contributed to the soil formation in this region. This point
out that low supply of Zn to plants and Zn deficient is a
problem in such soils [8]. Fig. 1 showed negative
significant relationship (r = - 0.16) between the
amounts of DTPA-Zn and percent of total CaCO 3 in
soils. Similar results were obtained by Hafez et al. [21],
El-Bendary et al. [24] and Sadik et al. [25]. It was
reported that DTPA-Zn is negatively correlated with both
Ca-saturation in soil, high pH and basic saturation of soils
[20, 21]. On the other hand, Figs. 2 and 3 showed positive
significant correlation between DTPA-Zn and percentage
of each of O.M (r = 0.64) and clay (r = 0.55). This was also
obtained by Abdel-Mottaleb et al. [20], Hafez et al. [21].
On the other hand the data also showed that, there were
no correlations between DTPA-Zn and either percentage
of sand or silt (r = 0.03 and 0.09, respectively) in soils.
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Zn-DTPA (mg Zn/kg soil)
2.5
y = 1.160X + 0.031
r = 0.64
2
1.5
1
0.5
0
0
0.2
0.4
0.6
0.8
1
1.2
1.4
O.M. %
Fig. 2: The relationship between the amount of DTPA-extractable Zn and O.M. content in soils of Banger El-Sokkar
region.
Zn-DTPA (mg Zn/kg soil)
2.5
y = 0.012X + 0.259
r = 0.55
2
1.5
1
0.5
0
10
15
20
25
30
35
40
45
50
clay %
Fig. 3: The relationship between the amount of DTPA-extractable Zn and clay fraction content in soils of Banger ElSokkar region.
Table 3: The dry weights of shoots and roots (g/plant), Zn concentration (mg/kg), Zn uptake (mg/plant), Zn use efficiency (g DW/mg Zn applied) and Zn
utilization efficiency (g DW/mg Zn absorbed) of three wheat cultivars grown on Zn-deficient soils and Zn-sufficient soils
Zinc status in soil
Wheat cultivars
Dry weight
-------------------Shoot
Root
Deficient
Sakha-93
Gemiza-7
Giza-168
0.18
0.15
0.15
0.07
0.07
0.05
21
29
26
3.78
4.35
3.90
0.02
0.01
5.0
1.02
--
--
Sakha-93
Gemiza-7
Giza-168
0.59
0.58
0.49
0.14
0.15
0.14
69
74
72
40.71
42.92
35.28
6.44
6.32
5.35
0.015
0.014
0.014
0.04
0.01
4.01
4.00
--
--
LSD 0.05
Sufficient
LSD 0.05
Shoot Zn conc.
Plant Growth: Table 3 showed significant variations in
the dry weights of shoots and roots of Sakha-93, Gemiza-7
and Giza-168 wheat plants grown in Zn-deficient soils.
However, it is clear that Sakha-93 wheat cultivar had
higher dry weight of shoots than those of Gemiza-7 and
Giza-168. While, those of roots where higher in Gemiza-7
Shoot Zn uptake
Zn use efficiency shoot
15.43
12.86
12.86
Zn utilization efficiency shoot
0.048
0.035
0.039
and Giza-168 than those of Sakha-93. However, there is no
significant different in the whole plant dry weight for the
three wheat cultivars when grown in the original soil.
These results are in full agreement with those obtained by
El-Bendary et al. [24], Liu et al. [26] and Ranjbar and
Bahmaniar [27].
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World Appl. Sci. J., 25 (11): 1519-1524, 2013
Zinc in Plants: Table 3 showed significant increase of Zn
concentration in shoots of three wheat cultivars grown in
Zn-deficient and sufficient soil. The Zn concentration in
plant shoots was in harmony with those obtained by
EL-Bendary et al. [24],Cakmak et al. [28], Tolay et al. [23]
and Maqsood et al. [29], which have an variations of Zn
concentration in shoots wheat cultivars. Also, Table 3
showed that the amount of Zn uptake by shoots was
increased with increasing Zn in soil. The data showed that
Zn-deficient soil has very low Zn supply to wheat plant.
Values of Zn UEshoot and Zn UtEshoot were greater with
Sakha-93 than with Gemiza-7 and Giza-168 wheat cultivars.
The differences among wheat genotypes for Zinc use
efficiency (ZnUEshoot) had also been reported by Maqsood
et al. [29].This indicated that Sakha-93 had higher zinc
utilization efficiency for the soil zinc or/and applied Zn
than the other two cultivars when grown in Zn- deficient
soil. El-Bendary et al. [24] concluded that distinct
differences among wheat cultivars in terms of sensitivity
to Zn-deficiency were closely related to zinc. It can be
concluded that the cultivar Sakha-93 of high zinc use
efficiency can be recommended for overcoming soil zinc
deficiency in calcareous soil.
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