Comparison of nitrogen mineralized under anaerobic and aerobic conditions for some agricultural and forest soils of washington

Abstract Seven agricultural soils and eight forest soils from Washington state were tested for mineralizable nitrogen using both anaerobic and aerobic incubation procedures. Each procedure had been used previously to. develop nitrogen indices for agricultural and forested ecosystems. Forest soils mineralized less nitrogen under anaerobic than aerobic conditions, while the opposite was true for agricultural soils. There were statistically significant correlations between the two methods for each of the time periods tested. Experimental variations were consistently lower than previously reported.