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Abstract
Total sulphur in soils was determined by ignition with a NaHCO3/Ag2O mixture, extraction with HC1 and measurement of sulphur by inductively coupled plasma‐atomic emission spectrometry. Significant spectral interference from other extracted elements (mainly iron and aluminium) was corrected using an off‐peak background reading. Recovery of sulphur added to soil as K2SO4 was complete and barium did not interfere when added in amounts equivalent to 2000 μg g‐1 soil. The total sulphur values for a range of New Zealand pastoral soils determined by this method were on average 104% (SEM=1,4) of the values obtained by the NaOBr oxidation method of Tabatabai & Bremner (1). The method enables analysis of relatively large sample numbers.