Nutrient management in fruit crops: An organic way.

The sustainable approach to fruit crop fertilization focuses on the increasing and maintaining of soil fertility. The utmost parameter that defines soil fertility is its content in organic matter (OM) that can be increased by temporary or permanent intercropping, mulching, adoption of amendments originated by the recycling of organic by-products. To increase nutrient use efficiency, the release of nutrients, as a consequence of the mineralization of OM, and root uptake timing should be synchronized, particularly for those nutrients (i.e. mineral N) that are not hold by soil nutrient holding capacity. The rate of nutrient application is the result of tree requirement and soil availability. The former is estimated by the amount of nutrient found in the different tree organs during orchard lifetime. Soil fertility is measured, during the growing season, by soil analysis, and it is recommended particularly for nutrients that are easily leached out with the excess of water.