Deep ploughing in the summer fallow season and optimizing nitrogen rate can increase yield, water, and nitrogen efficiencies of rain-fed winter wheat in the Loess Plateau region of China

Rongrong Zhang; Peiru Wang; Wenxiang Wang; Aixia Ren; Hafeez Noor; Rong Zhong; Zhiqiang Gao; Min Sun

doi:10.7717/peerj.14153

Deep ploughing in the summer fallow season and optimizing nitrogen rate can increase yield, water, and nitrogen efficiencies of rain-fed winter wheat in the Loess Plateau region of China

PeerJ. 2022 Oct 7:10:e14153. doi: 10.7717/peerj.14153. eCollection 2022.

Authors

Rongrong Zhang^#^{1

2

3}, Peiru Wang^#¹, Wenxiang Wang¹, Aixia Ren^{1

2

3}, Hafeez Noor^{1

3}, Rong Zhong¹, Zhiqiang Gao^{1

2

3}, Min Sun^{1

2

3}

Affiliations

¹ Department of Agronomy, Shanxi Agriculture University, Taigu, Shanxi, China.
² Collaborative Innovation Center for High-Quality and Efficient Production of Characteristic Crops on the Loess Plateau Jointly Built by Provinces and Ministries, Taigu, Shanxi, China.
³ Shanxi Agricultural University, State Key Laboratory of Sustainable Dryland Agriculture, Taiyuan, Shanxi, China.

^# Contributed equally.

Abstract

Background: About 60% of the annual precipitation in the Loess Plateau occurs during the summer fallow season, and does not align with the wheat growing season. In addition, the nitrogen use efficiency is low in this area because nutrient availability is affected by drought. As a result, rainwater storage during the summer fallow season is very important to increasing nitrogen use efficiency, and to the stable production of dryland wheat in the Loess Plateau.

Methods: A 3-year field experiment in the eastern part of the Loess Plateau was conducted with two tillage methods (no tillage (NT) and deep ploughing (DP)) and five N rates (0, 120, 150, 180, and 210 kg N ha^-1) to study the effect of tillage on soil water utilization, plant nitrogen utilization, and wheat yield.

Result: Compared to NT, DP showed a larger increase in soil water storage (SWS_f) and precipitation storage efficiency (PSE_f) during the two dry summer fallow seasons than in the normal summer fallow season. DP substantially increased the pre-anthesis soil water consumption (SWC_pre) and N translocation. The average yield under DP was 12.46% and 14.92-18.29% higher than under NT in the normal and dry seasons, respectively. A 1 mm increase in SWC_pre could increase grain yield by 25.28 kg ha^-1, water use efficiency (WUE) by 0.069 kg ha^-1 mm^-1, and nitrogen utilization efficiency (NU_tE) by 0.029 kg kg^-1. DP could reduce the N rate by 11.49-53.34% in the normal seasons and 40.97-65.07% in the dry seasons compared to the same highest point of yield, WUE, and NU_tE under NT.

Conclusion: Deep ploughing in the summer fallow season, paired with optimized N application, could help increase wheat yield and nitrogen efficiency in dryland.

Keywords: Grain yield; Nitrogen use efficiency; Plant nitrogen translocation; Soil water consumption; Tillage methods; Water use efficiency.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Agriculture* / methods
China
Nitrogen / analysis
Rain
Seasons
Soil
Triticum*
Water / analysis

Substances

Nitrogen
Water
Soil

Grants and funding

This work was supported by the State Key Laboratory of Sustainable Dryland Agriculture (No. 202003-2), the Central Guidance on Local Science and Technology Development Fund (YDZJSX2021C016), the research program of SCO Institution of Modern Agricultural Development (SC021B004), and the Basic Research project of Shanxi Province (20210302123410). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.