Table 1.

Correlation coefficients describing relationships between original soil variables and scores for the first three principal components describing variation in the composition of soil samples (75% of variance cumulatively explained); strong correlations (r > 0.7) are shown in italics.

measurement	PC 1	PC 2	PC 3
pH	0.15	0.80	−0.43
conductivity	0.83	−0.10	0.04
ammonium nitrogen	0.27	0.16	0.81
nitrate nitrogen	0.42	0.54	−0.29
phosphorus	0.78	0.28	0.34
potassium	0.77	−0.25	−0.42
sulfur	0.82	−0.38	0.18
organic carbon %	0.77	−0.20	0.14
DTPA copper	0.73	0.46	−0.04
DTPA iron	0.61	−0.66	0.05
DTPA manganese	0.31	0.77	0.27
DTPA zinc	0.85	0.14	0.30
aluminium	0.11	−0.95	−0.05
calcium	0.70	0.64	−0.15
magnesium	0.89	0.31	−0.24
potassium	0.88	−0.25	−0.18
sodium	0.74	−0.48	−0.21
boron	0.82	−0.27	0.04