Use of the Regularities of Within-Field Variability of Arable Soil Fertility in Precision Agrotechnologies

Abstract

Abstract. The paper states the regularities of the within-field variation of soil fertilitywhich are important for variable rate fertilizer application under conditions of precisionagrotechnologies including the technologies which limit the agroeconomic efficiency. Asit is well known, the usual (traditional) fertilizer practice stipulates their application takinginto account average indices of soil fertility: mobile plant food elements (N, P, K etc.)content in the plow layer. At the same time, one part of the plants gets excess of mineralnutrition, and the other part – its deficiency. That results in shortage of agricultural products,their deterioration and also the pollution of the environment and the soil with the excessesof agrochemicals in overfertilized plots. In the last decades traditional technologies giveplace to high-precision agrotechnologies with differentiated fertilizer application takinginto account within-field heterogeneity of soil fertility. There are several constraints forwidespread adoption of high-precision agrotechnologies including the underestimation ofthe character of within-field variability of soil quality. Our investigations reveal eightregularities of the within-field variation of agrochemical indices, which characterize soilfertility in arable soils. These regularities would allow to more seriously estimate theefficiency of variable rate fertilizer application under conditions of precisionagrotechnologies.Key words: soil, within-field contours, variability, regularities, precision agriculture.