Potato holds the largest spread in the Apuseni Mts area as a cultivated plant, while being an essential element for the inabitants and their livestock, as the basic food support of the population in the area. Alongside the part played as a basic food for the population in the mountain area, the importance of the potato is increased as the altitude increases, being used as fodder for animal husbandry, due to the fact that agricultural plants under crop are limited to potato, rye, oat, certain fruit trees, certain vegetables, while the rest of areas are covered with natural pastures and forests. Potato holds the largest spread, as maize hybrids- even the early ones- do not reach maturity in this high area of the Apuseni Mts. The numerous research in the area led to the conclusion that there are good and even very good pedoclimatic conditions for the potato crop, also taking into consideration the climatic anomaliies lately. The severity of the impact exerted by climatic changes varies from one region to another and has a serious effect on agriculture. In this highly important sector, climate changes will affect crop harvesting, animal husbandry and the location of production. The increasing possibility and severity of climate events will lead to the increase the risk of calamity for cultivated agricultural and horticultural plants. Climate change will also affect the soil, decreasing the organic matter content – a major contributor to soil fertility. In this context, bearing in mind the basic occupation of inhabitants in the mountain area which is animal husbandry, a certain amount of organic fertilizers is presently obtained. However, through a rational capitalization, it can represent the main potato fertilization source in the area, bringing a contribution to the recovery of physical and chemical soil traits and implicitly maintaining their fertility. The specificity of the main potato product, its tubers, as underground stalks leads to a high demand with regard to physical soil traits, as potatoes only undergo normal development in sufficiently aerated soils. Thus, the most indicated soils for potato cultivation are well aerated and dispersed soils, with a loamy or a loamy-sandy texture. The requirement for soil aeration becomes apparent even from planting, as only good aeration leads to intense breating and thus more rapid germination. Consequently, stolons, as well as tubers, grow and develop normally only in well-aerated soils that are porous and rich in nutritive elements. Assessments on soils aimed for potato cultivation in our country were conducted by Teaci, Berindei, Copony, Maxim, Canarache and other specialists who have worked in the field.The objectives of the presented research aim at the effect of physical soil traits and organo-mineral fertilization on the quantitative and qualitative production of potato tubers, as well as the increase of the organic matter content in the soils for the promotion of sustainable and evironmentally-friendly agriculture in the area.The research conducted studies the effects of the soil’s physical traits and differentiated organo-mineral fertilization systems in potato, through long-term field experiments, aiming at the quantitative achievement of tuber productions per surface unit  and the modification of the main agrochemical soil indices. The results obtained will be part of an agrochemical optimization model for the soil-plant system in the potato crop, by setting the domains for the preservation of soil fertility and agrochemical risk domains (insufficiency-defficiency, excess-toxicity) for superior quantitative and qualitative tuber productions in the mountain area. The paper emphasizes the effect of differentiated organo-mineral fertilization and physical soil traits in the Apuseni Mts area on a districambosol (brown acidic soil) under potato crop for the quantitative and qualitative increase of tuber production per surface unit and for the maintenance and enhancement of soil fertility. Experiments were thus set on a districanbosoil, a brown acidic soil in the high subarea of the Apuseni Mts. at the basis of the north-north western slope in the Ariesul Mic river basin. The importance, originality and novelty of these agrochemical experiemnts are due to yet unsolved issued regarding fertilization combinations through the implementing of an ecologically-protective soil fertilization system to maintain and enhance the organic matter content according to the climatic specificity of the mountain area and the specific and overall consumption requirements of potato varieties in the area. In this respect, the experiments and overall research conducted in the present paper are new, useful and aim at the improvement of unfortunate situations (agrochemical risk-insufficiency-defficiency;  excess- toxicity for potato tuber production) and provide with alternatives in the field for the differentiation of fertilization systems in order to select practical solutions that are both agrochemically and economically accessible.  These ecologically-protective soil fertilization alternatives for potato crop in the mountain area accompanied by a rigorous agrochemical control, provide for a diversity of practical solutions in achieving the agrochemical optimum of the soil-plant system and protection of mountain ecosystems.

soil, fertiliztion, mineral elements, potato

Presentation: oral