A study was initiated at 4 locations: a mixed prairie with Stipa comata dominant in the brown soil zone (1994), a mixed prairie with Stipa comata and Stipa viridula dominant in the dark brown soil zone (1993), and 2 in the fescue prairie with Festuca campestris dominant in the black soil zone (1993). At each of the 4 sites, 5 treatments representing common production systems were seeded as monocultures [2 grass species, alfalfa (Medicago sativa, 'Beaver'), and 2 spring wheat (triticum aestivum, 'Katepwa') seeded as either continuous or as wheat-fallow], and 1 treatment consisting of abandoned cultivation were compared with a native community in a randomized complete block design with 4 replicates. Modifying the community through cultivation and seeding usually caused a reduction in the measured variable except for NaHCO3 inorganic phosphorus that increased. Cultivation rather than the plants of the new community was believed responsible for most of the observed changes in C, N, and various P fractions and the loss of water-stable aggregates remaining on the 2.0 and 1.0 mm sieves.
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