Impact of Organic Amendments and Soil Mulching Applications on Soil Properties and Soybean Productivity

This study aims to evaluate the effect of organic amendments and soil mulching on soil properties and soybean productivity grown under a drip irrigation system. The experiment was conducted at the Faculty of Agriculture farm (Demo) at Fayoum University, Egypt, located at 29°17′006″N and 30°54′055″E in the SI 2023 and SII 2024 seasons. Four soil amendment treatments were assessed, i.e., zero (control), 20 t ha-1 of compost (C), 10 t ha-1 of vermicompost (V) and a mixture of both 10 t ha-1 of compost + 5 t ha-1 of vermicompost (CV), and two organic soil mulching (SM) rates of rice straw (M0 and M1; zero and 8 t ha-1). The treatments were conducted using a randomized complete block arrangement (split-plot design) with three replicates. The results showed that the values of soil bulk density and hydraulic conductivity were significantly decreased by 5.56 and 10.98%, 12.35 and 31.44%, and 16.67 and 46.97% when applied to C, V, and CV, respectively, as compared with the control. On the other hand, there are significant increases in values of total porosity, water-holding pores, and useful pores by 0.43, 17.32, and 1.44%; 5.10, 26.45, and 5.66%; and 7.39, 33.19, and 8.28% when C, V, and CV are applied, respectively, as compared with the control. Soybean growth parameters and physiological attributes were significantly affected by the applied treatments. The application of CV+ SM8 significantly increased the values of weight 100 of seeds and seed and straw yield by 21.17, 6.11, and 24.29%, respectively, as compared with the control. It could be concluded that the combination of CV and SM8 led to an improvement in soil properties and the productivity of soybean plants.