Fertility of Arable Chernozems of Western Siberia during Long-Term Application of Mineral Fertilizers

Abstract

Western Siberia is the area of risk farming; however, it has always been and still remains a promising region for the development of modern agriculture. Unlike welldeveloped European chernozem or black soil, their Siberian counterparts are unstable to the anthropogenic impact. Therefore, the farming technologies for growing crops developed for the Central Black Earth Region are not acceptable for Western Siberia. Studies on the influence of increasing doses of mineral fertilizers were carried out in the Department of Soil Science and Agrochemistry of the Northern Trans-Ural State Agricultural University located in the forest-steppe zone of the Trans-Urals. These studies covered the application of fertilizers for the planned yield from 3.0 to 6.0 t/ha of crops in the period from 1995 to 2015. Partial migration of nitrate nitrogen outside the arable layer was identified. The transition of phosphorus fertilizers non-demanded by plants to phosphate forms that are inaccessible to them was revealed, which indicates the need for justification of doses of mineral fertilizers in the fields of Western Siberia. The negative effect of high doses (more than N120P30 kg/ha) on the agrochemical and agrophysical properties of arable balck soil in the Northern Trans-Ural region was revealed. For the period of 20 years the content of agronomically valuable aggregates (1.00-0.25 mm) has decreased from 89.9 to 76.5 mm, and their water resistance has droped down from 75.4 to 66.0%. Under the influence of mineral fertilizers, the rate of compaction of the arable horizon increases by 7.0% with respect to the natural soil fertility.

Journal of Water and Land Development

“…After snow melting until sowing in the region conditions 3-4 weeks pass, during this period the soil intensively loses moisture by evaporation [EREMIN 2018;KULYASOVA 2018;PLOTNIKOV et al 2018]. The adopted farming system includes chopping and spreading plant residues on the soil surface during harvesting crops and stubble leaving to eliminate soil erosion.…”