Spray and drip irrigation have significantly promoted the spatial layout of planting crops in modern agriculture in recent years. In particular, the irrigation efficiency has also been improved to reduce the labor costs in the large-scale production. Planting without ridges can be expected to serve as a promising potential technology during irrigation. This study aims to explore the effects of ridgeless planting on the yield, nitrogen uptake and utilization of winter wheat. A two-year (2022-2024) field experiment was carried out in Tai’an, Shandong Province, China. The wheat cultivars Shannong 56 (with medium and multi-spike characteristics) and Shannong 43 (with relatively larger spike characteristics) were used as the experimental materials. The planting pattern without ridges (T3) was set as the target treatment. Two control groups were taken as the traditional planting patterns of narrow furrows/wide ridges (T1) and wide furrows/narrow ridges (T2). The sowing areas of T1 and T2 were 28.57% and 10.71% lower than those of the T3 pattern, respectively, due to the presence of the ridges. A systematic investigation was implemented to clarify the influence of ridgeless planting on the grain yield, yield components, accumulation and transformation of above-ground dry matter and nitrogen, nitrogen uptake efficiency (UPE), utilization efficiency (UTE) and NUE of the winter wheat. A comparison was also made on the tradeoff between the wheat edge growth and seeds sowing area under different sowing patterns. The results showed that the edge growth effects in the T3 treatment were relatively lower 28.57% and 10.71% than those in the T1 and T2 treatments, respectively, in terms of the spike number per unit area, dry matter, and nitrogen accumulation at jointing, anthesis and maturity, as well as nitrogen uptake efficiency. The edge growth effects of the above indices were also reduced to promote the land utilization rates, grain yield and NUE, compared with the T1 and T2. The reason was that the absence of the ridge in the T3 treatment reduced the sowing area. Specifically, the spike number per unit area of T3 increased by 18.33% and 9.32%, respectively, compared with the T1 and T2. Meanwhile, the dry matter that remobilized from the vegetation organs at anthesis to the grain increased by 6.58% and 9.22%, respectively. The dry matter production post-anthesis increased by 15.18% and 8.47%, respectively. Thus, the yield of the T3 increased by 14.64% and 9.27% respectively. The above-ground nitrogen accumulation in the T3 treatment increased by 13.45% and 8.13%, respectively. While the UPE increased by 13.45% and 8.11%, respectively. Therefore, the NUE increased by 14.68% and 9.30%, respectively. The correlation analysis showed that the above-ground nitrogen accumulation and the UPE in the T3 pattern concurrently improved the yield and NUE. The finding can also provide a technical reference to increase the yield and the NUE of the winter wheat under large-scale planting.
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From the 2009-2010 wheat growing season, four cultivation modes were designed and set up. The effects of cultivation modes on soil physical and chemical properties, nitrogen nutrition index of winter wheat, nitrogen supply and demand balance in wheat field, uptake and utilization of nitrogen and grain yield were investigated, in order to provide a theoretical guidance for further optimizing the soil-crop system integrated management mode.
Four cultivation modes were designed: local farmer mode (T1), improvement mode based on farmers (T2), high-yield and higher-yield mode regardless of production cost (T3), and soil-crop system integrated management mode (T4).
After 13 wheat-maize growing seasons, the soil bulk density of surface soil for T1, T2, T3 and T4 modes decreased by 6.21%, 9.80%, 12.25% and 13.56%, respectively; the content of organic matter for four modes increased by 21.88%, 26.80%, 32.05% and 36.39%, respectively; the corresponding increases were 34.16%, 12.38%, 39.60% and 20.79% for the contents of total nitrogen; 47.85%, 48.87%, 74.49% and 62.21% for the contents of alkali-hydrolysable nitrogen, respectively; 62.73%, 36.56%, 297.93% and 68.68% for the contents of available phosphorus; 14.36%, 40.00%, 221.20% and 59.60% for the contents of available potassium, respectively. The increases of 33.96%, 10.32%, 52.77% and 19.49% were observed in the inorganic nitrogen accumulation in the 0-100 cm soil layer, respectively. Correspondingly, the pH for T1, T2, T3 and T4 modes decreased from 7.50 to 6.28, 6.68, 5.35 and 6.64, respectively. There were significant differences in grain yield and nitrogen uptake and utilization among the four cultivation modes in 2020-2022 growing season. Compared with T1 mode, the grain yield of T2, T3 and T4 modes increased by 14.14%, 27.65% and 22.52%, respectively; the nitrogen use efficiency increased by 54.80%, 19.97% and 49.15%, respectively; the nitrogen recovery efficiency increased by 72.95%, 37.54% and 48.15%, respectively; the nitrogen surplus decreased by 49.76%, 11.62% and 44.14%, respectively; the nitrogen surplus rate decreased by 24.63%, 11.62% and 26.68%, respectively. The whole plant at anthesis stage and spikes at maturity stage under T4 mode were in nitrogen supply and demand balance.
After 13 wheat-maize growing seasons, the soil acidification trend of 0-20 cm was obvious, and the bulk density of surface soil decreased, but the contents of organic matter, total nitrogen and available nutrients such as nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium increased for the all four cultivation modes. Meanwhile, the accumulation of inorganic nitrogen in 0-100 cm soil layer increased accordingly. Compared with other three cultivation modes, a synergistic improvement was obtained under T4 mode in soil physicochemical properties, wheat grain yield and nitrogen use efficiency. However, the nitrogen use efficiency at present under T4 mode was not high enough and still needed to be further improved. As showed by present study, further synergistic optimization in grain yield and nitrogen use efficiency could not be achieved only by reducing nitrogen input.
Integrated agronomic optimization (IAO) adopts suitable crop varieties, sowing dates, planting density, and advanced nutrient management to redesign the entire production system according to the local environment, and it can achieve synergistic improvements in crop yields and resource utilization. However, the intensity and magnitude of the impacts of IAO on soil quality under long-term intensive production and high nitrogen use efficiency (NUE) require further clarification. Based on a 13-year field experiment conducted in Dawenkou, Tai’an, Shadong Province, China, we investigated the effects of four cultivation modes on the grain yield, NUE, and soil aggregate structure, as well as the fraction of organic matter (SOM) and soil quality, reflected by the integrated fertility index (IFI), during the winter wheat maturation periods in 2020–2022. The four cultivation modes were traditional local farming (T1), farmer-based improvement (T2), increased yield regardless of production cost (T3), and integrated soil–crop system management (T4). As the IAO modes, T2 and T4 were characterized by denser planting, reduced nitrogen (N) fertilizer application rates, and delayed sowing compared to T1 and T3, respectively. In this long-term experiment, IAO was found to maintain aggregate stability, increase SOM content (by increasing organic carbon and total nitrogen of the light fraction (LF) and the particulate organic matter fraction (POM)), and improve SOM quality (by increasing the proportions of LF and POM and the ratio of organic carbon to total nitrogen in SOM). Compared to T1, the IFI values of T2, T3, and T4 increased by 10.91, 23.38, and 25.55%, and by 17.78, 6.41, and 28.94% in the 0–20 and 20–40 cm soil layers, respectively. The grain yield of T4 was 22.52% higher than that of T1, and reached 95.98% of that in T3. Furthermore, the NUE of T4 was 35.61% higher than those of T1 and T3. In conclusion, our results suggest that the IAO mode T4 synergistically increases grain yield and NUE in winter wheat, while maximizing soil quality.
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