When you think of China, do you think of potatoes? Maybe not, but in the Loess Plateau region of northwestern China, potato is the main food crop.
When you think of China, do you think of potatoes? Maybe not, but in the Loess Plateau region of northwestern China, potato is the main food crop.
Even though it is such an important crop there, potato yields are lower than they could be. The area has a dry climate with uneven precipitation. Droughts are common, especially in the spring when crops are just starting to emerge. If soil moisture was more reliable, the potato crops would do better.
Rong Li and colleagues at Ningxia University in Yinchuan, China set out to discover if different tilling and mulching practices could improve soil moisture—and crop yields—in the Loess Plateau. The researchers studied three tillage options (conventional, no-till, and subsoiling) combined with three mulching options (no mulch, straw mulch, and plastic film).
Usually, the Loess Plateau fields are plowed, or tilled, after the harvest and left bare until spring planting. This is known as conventional tillage. Conservation tillage can mean not tilling the soil at all between crops (no-till). Another conservation option is subsoiling: deeply breaking the soil with a long blade, without turning it. Tillage helps water soak into the soil and improve water storage within the soil.
Read more at American Society of Agronomy
Image: Hillsides are terraced in the Loess Plateau, Dryland Agricultural Research Station, Doupo Village, China. (Credit: Xianqing Hou)
