Research paperEffects of optimized subsoiling tillage on field water conservation and summer maize (Zea mays L.) yield in the North China Plain
Introduction
For countries and regions with large populations and limited land resources, multiple cropping systems are an effective way to address issues of food security (if field heat is allowed) (Gao, et al., 2020). However, in some areas, water shortages restrict the development of multiple cropping systems. In the North China Plain (NCP), the primary agricultural area of China and the world, double cropping systems consisting of winter wheat-summer maize have been used widely (Kuang et al., 2020). This system makes full use of the crop growth time and effectively improves crop yields, thereby providing economic stabilization and social development in the region (Xiao and Tao, 2014). However, the NCP is in a semi-arid and semi-humid area, and the monsoon climate is significant, so the annual precipitation is low and occurs primarily in the summer. Thus, the double cropping system in the NCP has enough heat but a shortage of water resources (Gleeson et al., 2012). To ensure continuous crop yields, irrigation is provided by groundwater exploitation, but the long-term overexploitation of the groundwater in the NCP has resulted in the largest "groundwater funnel" in the world (Pan et al., 2014). Therefore, there is an urgent need to use precipitation and irrigation more efficiently and reduce the ineffective consumption of water to protect the agricultural ecological environment.
Tillage is an important practice that improves the soil physical structure, changes water infiltration, promotes the water storage and supply capacity, and regulates root growth and development (Govaerts et al., 2006, Cai et al., 2014, Liu et al., 2015, Soltanabadi et al., 2008). Appropriate tillage methods can accelerate the infiltration of surface water and reduce ineffective evaporation (Vita et al., 2007, Sun et al., 2018). Conversely, unsuitable tillage methods can reduce surface water infiltration, accelerate ineffective evaporation, affect the downward growth of roots, and ultimately reduce crop yields (Bogunovic et al., 2018). In the NCP, the primary planting model is the winter wheat-summer maize double cropping system, and during the summer growing season, summer maize receives more rainfall than the crops covering the other seasons. For many years, no-tillage techniques have been used for summer maize (following the harvest of winter wheat), and shallow rotary tillage has been adopted for winter wheat (usually shallower than the 15 cm soil layer) ( Guan et al., 2014). Although heat resources can be fully used, no-tillage leads to higher soil compaction, which causes early root senescence and plant lodging because the compacted soil is not conducive to water infiltration and the rooting of the maize plants (Ren et al., 2018). Thus, increases in the summer maize yields are limited. To overcome these limitations, the NCP must adopt optimized soil tillage techniques to improve the soil physical and chemical properties, which will then increase the soil water storage and supply capacity.
Subsoiling has been used to winter wheat production in China, but not to maize. When applied to summer maize, subsoiling results in more efficient precipitation/irrigation storage. However, optimized subsoiling techniques require overcoming or minimizing the negative effects of soil subsoiling separation and seed sowing operations in order to avoid agricultural production delays, loss of heat resources, high mechanical operation-associated costs, and uneven sowing. To address these issues, we developed a "maize subsoiling precision seeding machine" (Zhao and Zhang, 2012) for small-scale farmers in China. To ensure the sowing quality, the machine integrates subsoiling and sowing through alternating loosening and sowing processes. In this study, we used this machine to conduct subsoiling tillage in summer maize from 2014 to 2017 and investigated the effects on (ⅰ) the soil bulk density, porosity, and other physical properties, (ⅱ) the infiltration of irrigation and precipitation, the water distribution dynamics in the different soil layers, the inhibition of soil evaporation and reductions in farmland water consumption, and (ⅲ) the root and water distributions in the different soil layers and the corresponding physiological characteristics of the roots. The effects of the subsoiling tillage on the root-water apposition of summer maize, the yield formation, and the relationship between the yield and water use efficiency (WUE) were also analysed.
Section snippets
Site description
This study was performed over four summer maize growing seasons (from mid-June to early October, from 2014–2017) at the Xinji Experimental Station of Hebei Agricultural University, north of the NCP (Mazhuang Village, Xinji City, Hebei Province, China, 115.22E, 37.92 N, 43 m above sea level). From 1981–2013, the average annual precipitation and temperature at this station were 473.6 mm and 12.5 °C, respectively. The average precipitation and temperature during the summer maize seasons were
Soil bulk density and porosity
Compared to the NT treatment, the soil bulk density of the ST treatment in the 0–30 cm soil layer decreased by 6.4% (on average) over the entire growth period. The ST treatment effect of reducing the soil bulk density varied across the soil layers; the maximum soil bulk density reduction was observed in the 20–30 cm soil layer, which was 7.8% lower than that of the NT treatment group (Fig. 4a-c). The total soil porosity was significantly increased by the ST treatment. During the entire growth
Discussion
The key technologies for efficient farmland water use include improving the soil physical structure by optimizing the farming methods, increasing the water infiltration rate, reducing surface water evapotranspiration, and increasing the soil water storage capacity (Vita et al., 2007). Different farming methods have advantages and disadvantages for the soil composition and crop yield (Rochette et al., 2009, Bossio et al., 2010). For example, deep soil tillage can reduce the soil bulk density of
Conclusions
The subsoiling tillage of summer maize can significantly promote the infiltration of irrigation and high-intensity precipitation into the middle and deep soil layers, reduce the ET and E, optimize the root tissue structure, induce horizontal and vertical root elongation, and form a spatial-temporal coupling of the root system and the water storage layer. These improvements can lead to a “water-root positioning coordinate”, which coordinates the water supply and demand balance, alleviates root
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.
Acknowledgements
This work was supported by a National Key Research and Development Project (2017YFD0300906) and a National Science and Technology Support Project (2012BAD04B06).
References (47)
- et al.
Effective porosity of paddy soils as an estimation of its saturated hydraulic conductivity
Geoderma
(2004) - et al.
Effects of tillage practices on root characteristics and root lodging resistance of maize
Field Crops Res.
(2016) - et al.
Tillage management impacts on soil compaction, erosion and crop yield in Stagnosols (Croatia)
Catena
(2018) - et al.
Managing water by managing land:addressing land degradation to improve water productivity and rural livelihoods
Agric. Water Manag.
(2010) - et al.
Effect of subsoil tillage depth on nutrient accumulation, root distribution, and grain yield in spring maize
Crop J.
(2014) - et al.
Quantifying the crop management influence on arable soil condition in the Inland Pampa (Argentina)
Geoderma
(2007) - et al.
Does precipitation keep pace with temperature in the marginal double-cropping area of northern China?
Eur. J. Agron.
(2020) - et al.
Long-term consequences of tillage, residue management, and crop rotation on maize/wheat root rot and nematode populations in subtropical highlands
Appl. Soil Ecol.
(2006) - et al.
Tillage practices affect biomass and grain yield through regulating root growth, root-bleeding sap and nutrients uptake in summer maize
Field Crops Res.
(2014) - et al.
Subsoiling improves soil physical and microbial properties, and increases yield of winter wheat in the Huang-Huai-Hai Plain of China
Soil . Res.
(2019)
Effects of rotational tillage practices on soil properties, winter wheat yields and water-use efficiency in semi-arid areas of north-west China
Field Crops Res.
Stand establishment, root development and yield of winter wheat as affected by tillage and straw mulch in the water deficit hilly region of southwestern China
J. Int. Agric.
Subsoil compaction and irrigation regimes affect the root–shoot relation and grain yield of winter wheat
Agric. Water Manag.
Water transmission characteristics of a vertisol and water use efficiency of rainfed soybean (Glycine max (L.) Merr.) under subsoiling and manuring
Soil . Res.
Integrated assessment of cropping patterns under different policy scenarios in Quzhou County, North China Plain
Land Use Policy
Soil physical properties and maize root growth under different tillage systems in the North China Plain
Crop J.
Ammonia volatilization following surface application of urea to tilled and no-till soils: a laboratory comparison
Soil . Res.
Effects of tillage practices on water consumption characteristics and grain yield of winter wheat under different soil moisture conditions
Soil . Res.
DEM simulation of bionic subsoilers (tillage depth >40 cm) with drag reduction and lower soil disturbance characteristics
Adv. Eng. Softw.
Contributions of cultivars, management and climate change to winter wheat yield in the North China Plain in the past three decades
Eur. J. Agron.
Effects of different sub-soiling frequencies incorporated into no-tillage systems on soil properties and crop yield in dryland wheat-maize rotation system
Field Crops Res.
Effect of four different tillage practices on soil physical properties under cowpea
Agric. Biol. J. North Am.
Effect of subsoiling on soil bulk density, penetration resistance and cotton yield in northwest of Iran
Int. J. Biol. Sci.
Cited by (27)
The effect of tillage methods on soil physical properties and maize yield in Eastern Inner Mongolia
2023, European Journal of AgronomyPlastic mulching significantly improves soil enzyme and microbial activities without mitigating gaseous N emissions in winter wheat-summer maize rotations
2022, Field Crops ResearchCitation Excerpt :For summer maize, ten consecutive ears were manually harvested from the two middle rows of each plot to determine maize yield. Grain yield was adjusted to 14 % water content (Tsimba et al., 2013; Yin et al., 2021). All data and figures were analyzed using R version 4.1.2 (R Core Team, 2014).
Subsoiling combined with irrigation improves carbon emission and crop water productivity of winter wheat in North China Plain
2022, Agricultural Water ManagementCitation Excerpt :Photosynthetic products of plants were transported to the root region to provide sufficient nutrition for root growth and promote root growth and development, thus enhancing root respiration (Scandellari et al., 2015; Simpson et al., 2020). Studies by Wang et al. (2021) and Yin et al. (2021) showed that subsoiling significantly improved crop root density and activity, and stronger root conditions improved soil respiration rate (Valenzuela-Balcazar et al., 2022). And Xu et al. (2020) confirmed that irrigation had a significant impact on crop root respiration rate.
Evaluation of no-tillage impacts on soil respiration by <sup>13</sup>C-isotopic signature in North China Plain
2022, Science of the Total Environment
- 1
Baozhong Yin and Zhaohui Hu contributed equally to this study.