Brazil is the greatest citrus producer and exporter of concentrated orange juice in the world. In the Northeast, the citriculture has a large social importance for farming family, which is predominantly cultivated for small farmers. In Bahia state the citriculture has been exploited under several technology conditions and especially in the Costal table lands soil the orchards have low longevity and productivity based on the cohesive soil limitations for rural production. The purpose of this paper was to characterize the physical and chemical qualities of the cohesive yellow latosol with citrus crop in a conventional tillage system of the Coastal Table Lands in Bahia. The study was developed at the Recôncavo Baiano region, Brazil, from 2006 through 2007, where the orchards are usually cultivated with "Pera" sweet orange (Citrus sinensis L. Osb.) grafted on 'Rangpur' lime (Citrus limonia L. Osb.). It was used the soil quality index model proposed by Karlen & Stott (1994) and the soil samples were taken from the 0.00 - 0.20 m and 0.20 - 0.40 m layers. The results showed that under conventional tillage systems the citrus presented chemical and physical limitations for the root growth in depth, presenting a medium soil quality index, with limitations in RP100kPa, permeability and organic matter. The soil presents difficulties to maintain water supply and availability for Citrus crops during the long period of water shortage, what demands the use of agricultural practices with the purpose of minimizing these problems, such as the use of cover crop, production and addition of organic material to soil and subsoiling.
Costal table lands soil; soil quality; orange
