Crop yield and water use efficiency in response to long-term diversified crop rotations

Abstract

Crop production and water productivity may be impacted by diverse crop rotation and management practices. A field study was conducted from 2017-2020 in the Loess Plateau to evaluate the effects of crop rotation sequences on pre-planting and post-harvest soil water storage (SWS), annualized crop yield, water use, and water productivity. Crops in rotation included oil flax (Linum usitatissimum L.) (F), wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) (W), potato (Solanum tuberosum L.) (P). Twelve 4-year-cycle crop rotation treatments, along with a continuous oil flax treatment as a baseline, were included. The results showed that the average soil water content under the 0-150 cm soil layer in all treatments was increased after one rotation cycle, and the PWFW treatment achieved the highest SWC (17.1%). The average soil water storage (winter fallow season) and evapotranspiration (ETa) (growing season) under different crop rotation sequences were lower than those under continuous oil flax cropping. The ETa of FFFF increased by 28.9, 2.7, 15.3, and 28.4%, compared to average crop rotations in 2017, 2018, 2019, and 2020, respectively. Crop rotation had a significant effect on average annual yield and water use efficiency (WUE), which varied by year and rotation sequence. The crop rotations with the highest grain yield of oil flax were FFWP (2017), WFWP (2018),WPFF (2019) and FWPF (2020); the grain yield of wheat was highest when the two pre-crops (previously cultivated crops) were F-F, and potato yield was highest when the two pre-crops were W-F (except 2018). On average, the WUE of oil flax was 8.6, 38.7, 22.7, and 42.1% lower with FFFF than other diversity crop rotations in 2017, 2018, 2019, and 2020. We found that the WUE was not the largest when the grain yield of oil flax and wheat was highest. The treatments with maximum grain yield and WUE were not consistent. Our findings also revealed that wheat-potato-oil flax or potato-wheat-oil flax rotation could increase oil flax grain yields while wheat-oil flax-potato-oil flax markedly improved oil flax WUE.

Using Date Palm Waste as an Alternative for Rockwool: Sweet Pepper Performance under Both Soilless Culture Substrates

“…This finding is contradictory with [54], who found that the water consumption of pepper plants grown in perlite was significantly higher than that of plants grown in rice straw. Water use efficiency (WUE) is usually calculated based on the fruit yield given per unit of water consumed by the crop [58]. The protected culture industry is continually seeking alternative substrates that are locally available, economically feasible, and sustainable, to replace conventional growing media sources [59].…”

“…Water use efficiency (WUE) is usually calculated based on the fruit yield given per unit of water consumed by the crop [ 58 ]. The protected culture industry is continually seeking alternative substrates that are locally available, economically feasible, and sustainable, to replace conventional growing media sources [ 59 ].…”

Multi-year crop rotation and quicklime application promote stable peanut yield and high nutrient-use efficiency by regulating soil nutrient availability and bacterial/fungal community

“…In addition, it is worth noting that while crop rotation (T2, T4) and crop rotation in combined with quicklime application (T3, T5) are superior to continuous cropping (T1) in guaranteeing peanut yields, there is a tendency for the yield advantages of these four cultivation managements tend to decline year after year. It has been shown that different crop rotation patterns have different soil mineral nutrient content and soil water retention capacity due to different cultivated crops (Zhang et al, 2019;Cui and Yan, 2022). Although crop rotation plays an important role in improving the multifunctionality of soil ecosystems and maintaining the yield stability of the main crop, for main crop with sensitive mineral fertilizer and water requirements, multi-year crop rotation cannot make up for the differences in mineral fertilizer requirements and water-fertilizer coupling effects of the main crop, and the differences in different crop rotation patterns will decrease with the increase in the number of cropping years (Liu et al, 2023).…”

Assessment of Structural Components in the Formation of Productivity of Different Lens culinaris Varieties Against the Background of the Use of Mineral Fertilizers

“…The diversification of crop rotation and introduction of drought resistant, heat resistant crops and varieties is of importance to establish agricultural sustainability in changing climate (Choukri et al, 2022;Cui et al, 2022;Li et al, 2021). In the context of this investigation, Lens culinaris (lentil) demonstrates exemplary potential as a formidable candidate.…”