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- Title
Influence of field margin strip and no-till management on weed seed decay in soil.
- Authors
Nikolić, Nebojša; Zanin, Giuseppe; Squartini, Andrea; Marini, Lorenzo; Masin, Roberta
- Abstract
Conservation Agriculture is becoming a prominent method of soil management in cropproduction. Thanks to its basic principles, which are minimum soil disturbance,permanent residue cover and crop rotation, it is able to tackle the problems of soilerosion, desertification and soil infertility. Due to the lack of tillage operations, seedspresent in these soils experience different microclimatic and microbial conditionsto those in disturbed soils. In this work the decay process of five weed species,Abutilon theophrasti, Alopecurus myosuroides, Amaranthus retroflexus, Digitariasanguinalis and Portulaca oleracea, was compared between a soil managed under no-tilland the adjacent buffer zone. Twelve small steel mesh bags for each species filledwith 50 seeds were buried in both sites on July 2017 at 12 cm depth. Starting fromOctober 2017, after 3, 9, and 15 months four bags per species were exhumed. Afterexhumation, the seeds were tested, firstly using the 'unimbibed crush test’. Thosethat failed the test were marked as degraded, those that passed were subjected to agermination test, placed in Petri dishes with 2 ml of distilled water and put in anincubator at 25/15 ˚ C and at 12/12h dark/light photoperiod. Germination processwas monitored every 2-3 days. After a few weeks the non-germinated seeds werestored at 4 ˚ C for four weeks and then again placed in an incubator with optimaltemperature for germination. After twice in the incubator the tetrazolium test wasperformed on the non-germinated seeds to control their vitality. Ultimately the seedswere classified as degraded, germinated, dormant (vital under tetrazolium test) andnon-viable.Microbial activity of the soil was tested in both sites using fertimeters made out of cotton andsilk threads, to examine the cellulolytic and protolithic microbial activity respectively. Threetreatments were used: nitrogen, phosphorus and control (not treated), in order to examine thenutrient content. Analysis consisted of burying fertimeters in the soil in both sites beforeevery exhumation of the seeds, and later measuring their degradation using a dynamometer.After 7 days the fertimeters were exhumed, dried and their degradation level tested. Factorialanalysis of variance (ANOVA) was performed to analyse the effect of site and speciesand their interaction on seed degradation. ANOVA was also performed to analysefertimeters degradation. Homogeneity of variance was tested using Levene’s test.Significant differences among means were identified using the Newman-Keulstest.A. theophrasti and A. myosuroides were the two most degraded species while P. oleracea wasthe least degraded. Fertimeters from the field were more degraded than those from the bufferstrip. Degradation of cotton threads was higher in the field, indicating greater activity ofcellulolytic microorganisms. Degradation of the control was also higher than that of treatedfertimeters, meaning that there were no deficiencies in nutrients. Seed degradation level washigher in the field than in the buffer strip, which is in accordance with the dataobtained from fertimeters, showing higher microbial activity in the no-till field.
- Subjects
WEED seeds; WEED control; PORTULACA oleracea; CROP residues; SOILS
- Publication
Geophysical Research Abstracts, 2019, Vol 21, p1
- ISSN
1029-7006
- Publication type
Article