INFLUENCE OF TILLAGE PRACTICES ON YIELD, WATER CONSERVATION AND SOIL LOSS: RESULTS OF FIELD EXPERIMENTS IN THE EASTERN LOESS PLATEAU (HENAN PROVINCE, CHINA)
Abstract In order to examine the effect of alternative tillage practices on crop yield, water conservation and soil loss, a field study was conducted over a period of 4 years. On field plots near Luoyang (Henan province, China) the following tillage practices were applied: reduced tillage, no-tillage, subsoiling and conventional tillage. Rainfall simulation experiments were done to examine the effect of tillage on runoff and soil losses. Negligible runoff amounts were observed on the no-tillage plot. Subsoiling reduced runoff and soil losses by more than 50, respectively more than 90 % compared to conventional tillage. Although soil losses under reduced tillage decreased by half compared to conventional tillage, the differences in runoff amounts were small. For every year of the field trial period, subsoiling was found to give the highest yields. On average, an increase of 11% was observed compared to conventional tillage. The average yield from the no-tillage plots was slightly higher than under conventional tillage, while a slightly lower yield was found under reduced tillage. Because yield is an important criterion in promoting alternative tillage practices towards farmers, subsoiling can be regarded as a promising measure to improve soil and water conservation in the Eastern Loess Plateau of China
