The paper presents data on humus contents in 109 profiles of pseudogley soils in Kraljevo environs under three different forms of land use: arable land, meadow and forest. Soil analysis showed that forest pseudogley soils had the highest content of humus in the humus horizon, 5.99% on the average, while meadow soils followed with 3.37% and arable land with the lowest average humus content of 3.31%. The high content of humus and a tendency of its increase in forest pseudogley soils indicate deteriorating conditions regarding the mineralization of organic matter, which leads to intensification of its accumulation in soil. Well aerated arable land was found to undergo more intensive mineralization of organic matter and more intensive utilization, which decreases the content of humus. In the subhumus horizon, humus content was considerably lower, 1.99% on the average in forest soils, 1.27% in arable land and 1.15% in meadow soils. Humus contents were also found to vary considerably, their values in the humus horizon ranging from 2.85% to 9.68% in forest soils, from 2.01 to 6.03% in meadow soils and from 2.02 to 4.63% in arable land soils. In the subhumus layer of the profile, the most evident vatriation was registered in the arable land variant (0.44-4.01) of pseudogley (0.24-2.04). This high variation of humus contents in the pseudogley soils examined, especially forest soils, indicate very different amounts of organic residues as well as  different conditions of their degradation, accumulation and humification

humus; pseudogley soil; land use

Presentation: oral