Recovery of soils degraded by overgrazing, with different substrates in the department of Putumayo, Colombia

Abstract

Poor grassland management starts with the loss of plant vigor, leads to the spread of weeds and causes soil compaction, seriously
deteriorating the physical and chemical properties of the soil. This process is intensified by extensive cattle farming. In order to evaluate the recovery of soils degraded by overgrazing with different substrates -bovine compost, swine compost and green manure- in the department of Putumayo, an unrestricted randomized statistical design was used and the Tukey test was applied for differences between means. The results show that, arithmetically, T4 (bovine pre-composting) and T2 (green manure) treatments are arithmetically better. However, CV = 53.75 and (p<= 0.05) indicate that there were no differences between treatments; this may be due to factors such as forage species, soil fertility, crop management practices and weather during processing. 
Consequently, precomposts had no reaction for the above reasons and it is concluded that both the application of composts and the
implementation of forages can be effective in improving soil qualities. In any case, variables such as climatic conditions (high temperatures) must be taken into account; these have a negative effect on the germination processes of the fodder species.