Strategic deep tillage and crop rotation for improving productivity of non-sodic heavy soil in the low rainfall regions of Western Australia

Document Type

Conference Proceeding

Publication Date

10-2024

Conference Title

Adaptive Agronomy for a Resilient Future

Place of Publication

Albany, Western Australia

Keywords

Tillage, summer crop, break crop, water infiltration, subsoil constraints

Disciplines

Agronomy and Crop Sciences | Soil Science

Abstract

Non-sodic heavy soil in the low rainfall regions of Western Australia can be dense and poorly structured with alkaline clay in the subsoil, which prevents root exploration and potentially restricts grain yield. A 4-year long (2020-2023) field experiment was established near Bencubbin in 2020 to investigate whether the loosening of dense soil layers with a strategic deep ripping followed by a summer crop, super sweet sudan (SSS) forage sorghum and crop species of varying root architecture (barley, canola, chickpea, and vetch+oat), or fallow in 2021 can increase barley root exploration in the subsurface soil layers and yield in subsequent years (2022 and 2023). The results showed that deep ripping and SSS had no significant impact on barley grain yield in 2021, 2022 and 2023 compared to no ripping and without SSS. Barley grain yield in 2022 was significantly increased following fallow, chickpea and canola compared to following vetch+oat and continuous barley. In 2023, barley grain yield showed no significant difference due to extremely dry conditions. We concluded that deep ripping in this dense, non-sodic, heavy soil might have limited benefit on crop root exploration or yield. Summer crops such as SSS could be grown to fill the feed gap for grazing without significantly affecting the yield of the crops in the following years. Keeping the land fallow or growing break crops (e.g. canola/chickpea) might be beneficial for increasing cereal crop yield compared to continuous barley.

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