The feasibility of near infrared (NIR) spectroscopy for quantifying labile organic matter (OM) in arable soils and for predicting soil refractory OM fractions was tested on 37 soils varying in texture and soil carbon (C) content. Three sets of arable soils (0-20 cm depth) were sampled from 1) long-term field experiments with different OM inputs, 2) individual sites with inherent with-in field gradients in soil texture and/or C content, and 3) from a range of different sites covering variations in management and geological origin. The labile OM fraction was defined by the CO2 evolved from the soils incubated for 34 weeks while refractory CM was obtained by NaOCl oxidation. The labile fraction of the soil C accounted for 2-12% of the total soil C content. No systematic relationship between labile C content and total soil C or clay was found, but NIR spectra could be correlated well with the labile C fraction. A distinct, close linear relationship was found for C in soil before and after the NaOCl oxidation, indicating that this method was unable to reveal any additional information not contained in the total soil C measurement. NIR was also correlated with the NaOCl resistant C fraction, but this was considered to relate to the ability of NIR to predict total soil C contents. Thus NIR seemed to have the potential to estimate labile OM determined under laboratory incubations, while it still remains open how to identify and quantify refractory pools of soil OM.
