Effects of straw mulching on microclimate characteristics and evapotranspiration of drip-irrigated winter wheat in North China Plain

Abstract

Field experiments were conducted for two consecutive years (2013-2014 and 2014-2015) to study the effects of straw mulching on microclimate characteristics, energy flux, soil evaporation (E s) and evapotranspiration of winter wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) under adequate drip irrigation in North China Plain (NCP). The results revealed that straw mulching affected air temperature (T a) and dew point temperature (T d) near the soil surface but had little effect on relative humidity (RH) compared with non-mulched fields. Straw mulching increased the turbulent exchange coefficient (K), and K within the canopy was higher than that above the canopy. Straw mulching clearly increased the sensible heat flux (H) distribution in April-June, and part of the energy needed for evapotranspiration was provided by transfer from the warmer air aloft. There was a linear functional relationship between H and T a measured above and within the canopy. The straw mulching decreased E s but increased crop transpiration (T). Mulched treatment (TM) can decrease the total irrigation amount by about 7%-15% compared with the non-mulched treatment (TN). There were no significant differences (p>0.05) in cumulative crop evapotranspiration (ET c) between TM and TN treatments under adequate drip irrigation, and the use of mulch may need to be combined with an optimal deficit drip irrigation schedule for managing the declining water table in NCP.

Study on the Effect of Straw Mulching on Farmland Soil Water

“…In summary, under 4500 kg/hm 2 mulching, the soil has more water storage, higher water content, and higher water consumption, which is conducive to the efficient use of limited precipitation by crops, thus increasing the spring corn yield. Field experiments over three years show that 4500 kg/hm 2 straw (wheat) mulching in the dry farming area of southern Ningxia can better store water and protect soil moisture, promote the virtuous cycle of farmland soil water, and show outstanding performance in improving corn yield and water use efficiency, which can be popularized and implemented in spring corn production in this area [ 21 , 22 ].…”

Agricultura irrigada no Brasil: inovação, empreendedorismo e sistemas de produção

“…Por aumentar a micro rugosidade da superfície do solo e retardar o escoamento superficial, o maior volume de palha da produção irrigada também melhora a infiltração de água, melhorando o aproveitamento da chuva e reduzindo o deficit hídrico SATIRO et al, 2017). Considerando que, pelo menos, 5 a 8 t ha -1 (base seca) da palhada devem ser mantidas sobre a superfície para garantir boa conservação, infiltração e redução da evaporação de água do solo (SÁ et al, 2015;CASTIONI et al, 2018;LI et al, 2018;WANG et al, 2018), quanto maior a produtividade de palha, maior o percentual que poderá ser recolhido para produção de energia elétrica ou etanol de segunda geração.…”

Sustainable management practices to improve the water use efficiency of winter wheat in the North China Plain: a meta-analysis

“…Water-saving irrigation practices have been widely acknowledged to increase crop yield and improve the crop WUE (Sun et al 2019a;Yu et al 2020Yu et al , 2021. The application of straw return technology can also indirectly improve the crop WUE by reducing field evaporation, reducing irrigation amount, and effectively increasing the soil organic carbon (Berhane et al 2020;Gao et al, 2019a;Meyer et al 2019;Wang et al 2018a). In summary, optimized management practices can increase the ability of crops to use water, change the temporal and spatial distribution of water in farmland systems, reduce water loss, and hence optimize grain yield and the WUE, which may provide an opportunity for developing sustainable management practices.…”

“…However, most studies only focus on the impact of one or two management practices (such as irrigation or nitrogen application) on crop water use (Kan et al 2020;Liu et al 2019a;Peng et al 2018;Wang et al 2018a). Hence, the impact of tillage and other management practices on water use has been ignored in previous studies.…”

“…Researchers have conducted various studies on the correlation of crop production and WUE in the NCP, but the majority only focused on either winter wheat or summer maize (Liu et al, 2018a;Peng et al 2018;Wang et al 2018a;Zheng et al 2020). However, as the main cropping system in the NCP, the winter wheat-summer maize cropping system is an indivisible whole.…”