Abstract
Crop residue incorporation increases stable soil pores and soil water infiltration and reduces surface water runoff and soil erosion. However, few studies have examined the relationship between crop residue incorporation and water infiltration. A previous study showed that water infiltration increases depending on the quantity of applied wheat straw. In this study, we examined whether the relationship is applicable to different crop residues in a crop rotation. We grew corn, rose grass, and okra in crop rotation under plastic film houses and measured the water infiltration rate at the time of ridge making. A strong correlation was found between the quantity of applied residue and the soil water infiltration rate (r = 0.953), although there are outliers in the case of no prior crop. However, aboveground biomass of the prior crop showed a stronger correlation with water infiltration rate (r = 0.965), without outliers. Previous studies have revealed the exponential relation between plant root mass and soil erosion. Our data also show a positive relationship between resistance to erosion and root mass when assuming that aboveground biomass is proportional to the underground biomass. The result also showed that the effect of the prior crop root mass disappears within the next crop period. Our results indicate that maintaining a large root biomass is crucial for reducing soil erosion.
Highlights
Soil degradation is a major constraint of food security (Gomiero, 2016; Lal, 2015), and soil erosion represents one of the crucial intervention points for reversing soil degradation (Karlen & Rice, 2015)
There was a strong correlation between the quantity of incorporated residue dry weight and soil water infiltration rate (r = 0.953) in terms of nitrogen level treatment, initial corn residue showed outliers (Figure 1a)
Aboveground biomass of the prior crop showed a higher correlation with soil water infiltration rate (r = 0.965), without outliers (Figure 1b)
Summary
Soil degradation is a major constraint of food security (Gomiero, 2016; Lal, 2015), and soil erosion represents one of the crucial intervention points for reversing soil degradation (Karlen & Rice, 2015). What is the point of preventing soil erosion in practical? The Universal Soil Loss Equation (USLE) (Wischmeier & Smith, 1978) is the standard for estimating erosion. We show that the risk of erosion is reduced when a crop has covered soil surface. This emphasizes the importance of preventing erosion in the early stage of crop growth. Surface runoff after tillage almost never occurs if the infiltration rate of a field is larger than 30 mm 10 min−1. Technologies increasing the infiltration rate higher than the precipitation rate are needed to prevent soil erosion in tillage systems
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