Indicators of Physical Soil Quality of the Cereal Producing Andean Area of the Department of Nariño, Colombia

With the purpose of finding changes in some of the indicators of soil physical quality, in the Andean cereal growing areas of Narino, Colombia, the effect of time of use in different systems and outstanding was evaluated. The results showed that the increase in the labour labor intensity of generated using negative changes in some of the water and volumetric indicators. Available water decreased with at the mentioned evaluation depth in 12 % and 33 % in the soil cultured cultivated forduring 45 and 70 years, respectively. The change to agricultural use corn-wheat rotation (rt- m) for during 25 and 70 years increased the level of runoff in 95 % and 97 % compared to the control, which means that some water will affects soil hydric properties before 25 years of intensive use. Compared to the control, the apparent density of the pasture and the agricultural use increased in 27.6 % and 10 %, respectively. Within the agricultural use (rt- m), were no differences in bulk density and true density were observed, suggesting that in a few years of use, the soil loses volume. The total porosity reached acceptable agronomic levels, although the level of micropores was approximately 50 %. This can lead to drainage problems, water and nutrients supply to the plant and hydraulic conductivity.