Relationships of field traffic and tillage to corn yields and soil properties

Field Evaluation of Controlled Traffic Farming in Central Europe Using Commercially Available Machinery

“…Godwin et al (2015) suggested that this is not uncommon when dealing with field-scale trials in which soils exhibit moderately high heterogeneity, resulting in significant variability in the experimental data. This observation also agrees with experimental results reported by Negi et al (1981), which showed that the effect of traffic compaction on crop yield is dependent on the seasonal effect of weather. Godwin et al (2015) claimed that there is a risk of overly rigorous statistical significance levels impeding sensible adoption of improved soil management methods.…”

Field evaluation of soil moisture deficit thresholds for limits to trafficability with slurry spreading equipment on grassland

“…For example, compaction enhances seed–soil contact, improving germination and crop establishment (Radford & Nielsen, ), and it can increase crop yields in dry years (Namdari et al ., ). By contrast, a wide range of studies have reported reductions in crop yield as a result of soil compaction (Raghavan et al ., ; Negi et al ., ; Dawkins et al ., ; Radford et al ., ; Botta et al ., ; Chamen et al, ; Abu‐Hamdeh, ; McKyes et al ., ; Mamman et al ., ). Soil compaction increases soil specific resistance (Canarache, ) which, in turn, increases draft and implement wear (Godwin & Spoor, ).…”

Conservation tillage and water availability for wheat in the dryland of central Chile

“…However, the availability of water in the soil profile may be variable for each tillage system (Lafond et al, 1994). Negi et al (1981) reported for plots with zero tillage twice as much water available to the plants at a depth of 30 cm than in plots with conventional tillage, while Tollner et al (1984) found that the soil with zero tillage had significantly less water available for the plant near the soil surface than conventional tillage. In a review of research in northern China, the results showed that conservation tillage increased water storage from 3% to 50% and crop yield increased from 2-36% compared to conventional tillage, along with reducing the effects of erosion (Wang et al, 2007); in dry years the effect of conservation tillage tended to be greater than in wet years compared with conventional tillage.…”

“…Some authors have found that conservation tillage may reduce the total porosity in the surface horizon of the soil, modifying the pore size distribution, with predominance of fine pores, while the effect of plowing in a conventional system increases the number of larger pores (Negi et al, 1981;Tollner et al, 1984;Hill et al, 1985). The more compact surface of soils with zero tillage would explain the decreased infiltration of water in the profile (Pelegrin et al, 1990;Martinez et al, 2008).…”