Forest Soil and Land Reclamation Division, Forest Research Institute, Dehradun (Uttrakhand) India
This study was performed to enumerate the number of bacteria per gram soil from the bank of river Tons in Dehradun district of state Uttarakhand, India form different elevations. The soil in this area is flooded with water in rainy season, while partially moist in winter and summer. The study was carried out to enumerate and tally the number of bacteria per gram against soil from elevation and relate the results with pH, organic carbon, available potassium (K), phosphorus (P) and nitrogen (N) of the collected soil samples. Factors changes like temperature, water holding capacity, soil properties, vegetation, slope, micronutrients, availability of sunlight, human activities were not included in the study. The study shows that the average number of bacteria per gm. of soil decreased with decrease in elevation. The pH, organic carbon, and potassium didn’t show any particular trend of change according to elevation.