RELIEF INFLUENCE ON SPATIAL VARIATION OF PHYSICAL PROPERTIES IN SOILS OF MEADOW LANDSCAPES OF THE VOLGA RIVER FLOODPLAIN AND DELTA
Sorokin Andrey P. - Ph.D. in Biology, Associate Professor of Department of Soil Science, Land Management and Cadastre, , Astrakhan State University, 414056, Astrakhan, 1 Shaumyan sq., sor-and@mail.ru
Fedotova Anna V. - Professor, Doctor of Biological Sciences, chief researcher, head of the laboratory of Forecasting, Bioproductivity of Agroforestry Landscapes, Federal Scientific Center for Agroecology, Integrated Land Reclamation and Protective Forestry of the Russian Academy of Sciences (FSC Agroecology RAS), 400062, Volgograd Universitetskiy Ave., 97, a.v.fedotova@gmail.com
Melnikova Ekaterina S. - MA student, Astrakhan State University, 414056, Astrakhan, 1 Shaumyan sq., Ekaterina.melick@yandex.ru
An attempt has been made to assess the influence of the terrain relief (microrelief) on the spatial variation of the physical properties of soils, on the example of moisture, meadow biocenoses of the Volga-Akhtuba floodplain and the Volga delta at the landscape level using methods of mathematical statistics. It has been established that a distinctive feature of meadow soils of the Volga-Akhtuba floodplain is the total thickness of horizons A and AB, which in total varies from 65 to 67 cm. It is significantly greater than in the soils of the delta ecosystems. Correlation analysis showed that the topography influences the spatial distribution of moisture over the surface layers of the soils under study. The correlation coefficients showed a good and to a lesser extent close inverse relationship, i.e., soil moisture increases with decreasing in relief. The analysis of variance has shown that the relief of territory (68 %) and 32 % - some other factors considerably influence on spatial distribution of a moisture in soils of a floodplain. However, in delta soils the situation is opposite: the relief has a slight influence (34 %) and other factors (66 %) have a strong influence.
Key words: alluvial meadow soils, microrelief, Volga-Akhtuba floodplain and the Volga delta, correlation and variance analysis
