Abstract
Drought and the availability of mineable phosphorus minerals used for fertilization are two of the important issues agriculture is facing in the future. High phosphorus availability in soils is necessary to maintain high agricultural yields. Drought is one of the major threats for terrestrial ecosystem performance and crop production in future. Among the measures proposed to cope with the upcoming challenges of intensifying drought stress and to decrease the need for phosphorus fertilizer application is the fertilization with silica (Si). Here we tested the importance of soil Si fertilization on wheat phosphorus concentration as well as wheat performance during drought at the field scale. Our data clearly showed a higher soil moisture for the Si fertilized plots. This higher soil moisture contributes to a better plant performance in terms of higher photosynthetic activity and later senescence as well as faster stomata responses ensuring higher productivity during drought periods. The plant phosphorus concentration was also higher in Si fertilized compared to control plots. Overall, Si fertilization or management of the soil Si pools seem to be a promising tool to maintain crop production under predicted longer and more serve droughts in the future and reduces phosphorus fertilizer requirements.
Highlights
Drought and the availability of mineable phosphorus minerals used for fertilization are two of the important issues agriculture is facing in the future
Plants take up Si either actively or passively in form of monosilicic acid (H4SiO4), which typically occurs in a range of 0.1–0.6 mM in soil solution[17], subsequently forming biogenic amorphous silica in the plant tissues[18]
Our results clearly show an improved performance of wheat during drought after amorphous silica (ASi) fertilization
Summary
Drought and the availability of mineable phosphorus minerals used for fertilization are two of the important issues agriculture is facing in the future. We tested the importance of soil Si fertilization on wheat phosphorus concentration as well as wheat performance during drought at the field scale. Our data clearly showed a higher soil moisture for the Si fertilized plots This higher soil moisture contributes to a better plant performance in terms of higher photosynthetic activity and later senescence as well as faster stomata responses ensuring higher productivity during drought periods. Si fertilization or management of the soil Si pools seem to be a promising tool to maintain crop production under predicted longer and more serve droughts in the future and reduces phosphorus fertilizer requirements. Several parameters were found to be improved after Si-fertilization: higher biomass production[19,20,21,22], larger leaf a rea[19,23], elevated root length[20,21,22], increased plant n utrition[22], higher leaf water potential and higher relative plant water content[24], as well as increase photosynthetic activity and stomatal conductance of drought-stressed p lants[20,21,23]
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