Water use in Citrus: effect on porosity in water retention in a “Latossolo vermelho-escuro” of Northeast of Estado de Sao Paulo

[Abstract] The objective of this research was to study the porosity, bulk density and retention of water of an Oxisol, located in the Northwestern region of São Paulo state, Brazil. The soil was cultivated with Citrus sp., to which green manure was applied between rows for three years. Each of six species of green manure crops (Crotalaria junceaL., Mucunade eringian a Steph. & Bart., Canavalia ensiformis L. DC., Cajanus cajan L., Lablab purpureum L. and Ricinus communis L.) were seeded for three years (1995, 1996 and 1997) between Citrus rows, plus a treatment with a mix of all six species and a control (natural regrowth af vegetation). The experimental design was a randomized complete block design, with four replications for each of the eight treatments. Water retention, microporosity, macroporosity, total porosity and bulk density were analyzed in the beginning (1995) and end (1997) of the experiment, at three depth ranges (0-0.10; 0.10-0.20 and 0.20-0.40m). We concluded that there were statistically significant differences for bulk density, macroporosity, total porosity and retention of water among the different soil depth ranges; there were no significant differences among treatments though