ibps-so 2016 · Question 372 of 394

A cashew plantation proposal has been received from a high-rainfall upland tract of the peninsula, and the soil survey annexed to it describes the block as carrying a red, porous, deeply weathered soil which has lost most of its silica and its bases by leaching under a heavy rainfall and an alternately wet and dry climate, and which is correspondingly enriched in the oxides of iron and aluminium. The material is soft when cut fresh from the pit but hardens irreversibly on exposure to the air, and is quarried in the neighbourhood and cut into building blocks. The survey adds that the soil is acidic, very poor in nitrogen, phosphorus and calcium, and low in organic matter, so that the proposal must provide for liming and for a heavy organic dressing in the planting pits before the block will carry the crop. The soil so described is

1. AAlluvial soil
2. BBlack cotton soil
3. CLaterite soilCorrect
4. DDesert soil
5. EPeaty and marshy soil