Soil Density in Traditional Mouldboard Tillage

Abstract

Until recently, mouldboard ploughing was used as the main tillage in almost the entire territory of Ukraine and Russia. However, mouldboard technologies contribute to the formation of a “plough pan”, which contributes to additional soil compaction. The intensity of agricultural production exacerbated the problem of soil compaction by machine and tractor units. The over-consolidation of soil results in stunted plant root growth, lack of oxygen, and water and nutrient restrictions. Soil compaction can be reduced by deep local chiselling. The aim of the study was to determine the density of the soil at different depths during continuous traditional cultivation (reverse ploughing). The density of the soil was evaluated by resistance to penetration into the soil in a vegetable-forage crop rotation on an experimental field with continuous traditional tillage. The measurement of penetration resistance was carried out using an automatic electronic hardness tester “DATAFIELD”. The boundaries of the experimental field were determined, a computer map of the experimental field was compiled with automatic “grid” of plot sizes, two-dimensional mapping was carried out, and the sequence and place of measurements were developed. As a result, the level of soil compaction at different penetration depths and resistance to root growth was determined. It has been established that with constant traditional reverse tillage, the soil at a depth of more than 10 cm is sufficiently compacted. At a depth of 15 cm, a strong compaction of the soil is observed, which indicates its physical and hydrological degradation.

Keywords

• penetration resistance
• penetration depth
• electronic hardness tester
• mouldboard ploughing