Abstract
Smallholders in Asia and Africa require low-cost seed drills for minimal soil disturbance while establishing various crops. A seed drill that can be drawn by the widely-available two-wheel tractor (2WT) is an attractive option for mechanization of no-till in small-sized fields. The Versatile Strip Seed Drill (VSSD) was designed with the capacity to make up to 40 mm wide and 60 mm deep strips in untilled land along with seed and basal fertilizer application in a single-pass operation, while powered by the 8.95 to 11.93 kW 2WT. An important innovation of the VSSD was to fit the seed box with both fluted roller-type seed meters for delivery of sufficient small-size seeds to achieve adequate plant density per unit row length; and vertical disk-type seed meters for precision and spaced row planting of larger seeds. Both incessant seed dropping by fluted roller seed meters and spaced planting by vertical disk type seed meters provided optimum plant populations that were generally higher than in conventional, full-tillage plots with the same rate of hand broadcasted seed and fertilizers. Time required for crop establishment by VSSD ranged from 0.13 to 0.18 ha·h−1. When the VSSD was attached to the 2WT for crop establishment, the diesel fuel consumption varied from 4.4 to 6.1 L·ha−1, which was lower than for most 2WT-based planters previously used in Bangladesh. In on-farm multi-locations trials, wheat crops established with the VSSD had statistically similar grain yield compared to conventional tillage; however, significantly higher grain yield was obtained from mustard and lentil, by 14% and 19%, respectively. The VSSD is a unique, minimum-soil-disturbance multi-crop planter, and can be a platform on which to build conservation agriculture systems for small farms in Asia and Africa.
Highlights
IntroductionThe use of 2-wheel tractors (2WT) for land preparation and crop establishment is spreading in
The use of 2-wheel tractors (2WT) for land preparation and crop establishment is spreading inAsia and Africa, replacing manual and animal-draught farm power [1]
Effective field capacity was highest for sowing wheat seed in six rows and chickpea seed in five rows with fluted roller-type seed meters in the 2nd gear position of the 2WT; and the lowest capacity was for sowing maize and rice seeds in the 1st gear position of 2WT with vertical disk-type seed meters (Table 2)
Summary
The use of 2-wheel tractors (2WT) for land preparation and crop establishment is spreading in. Asia and Africa, replacing manual and animal-draught farm power [1]. Labor shortages, increasing labor costs, and crop intensification are trigger factors for increased adoption of mechanization by smallholder farms. Fragmented small farm sizes (less than 1 ha) and low-buying capacity of the smallholders restricts the purchase and utility of 4-wheel tractors in many parts of Asia and Environments 2016, 3, 1; doi:10.3390/environments3010001 www.mdpi.com/journal/environments. A wide range of 4-wheel tractor options for mechanized planting are not available to regions where field sizes are small and 2WT are the predominant source of power for mechanized tillage. A seed drill that can be driven by a 2WT and place seeds and fertilizer with minimal soils disturbance is an attractive option for mechanization in small fields
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