Impact of secondary soil tillage technology on soil particle displacement on sloping fields in central bohemia region

Abstract

One of the main factors of land degradation, not only in the Czech Republic, is soil erosion. One relatively new erosion factor is tillage erosion. More than 70 % of agricultural land (about 2 million ha) is used as cultivated in the Czech Republic. Effect of tillage erosion on the overall land degradation is often underestimated. Wrong way of implementation of soil tillage has a clear impact on land degradation. Relatively little expert studies have been devoted to this phenomenon. A field experiment was carried out for the purposes of measuring the displacement of soil particles during secondary tillage. The field experiment was situated in Nesperská Lhota location. Sloping land with light Cambisol was used for the measurement. Secondary tillage (seedbed preparation) was the evaluated technology. Metallic tracers (cube of aluminum - edge 12 mm) were used as an indicator of particle displacement. The influence of slope on the particle displacement was evaluated in the experiment. There were placed 30 tracers to the soil surface in one row and their position was determined. The field experiments had three options: to move the machine on a plane, machine movement against the slope and movement of the machine along the slope. Position of individual tracers relative to the original location was determined after the combinator Lemken passing. Metal detectors were used to determine the position of the metallic tracers after soil tillage. Travel distance of all tracers was deducted from their original locations. Their displacement is directly proportional to the displacement of soil particles during soil tillage. Whether the machine moves across the plane or against the slopes, the results were very similar. On the contrary, much higher transfer of particles was recorded as the machine moves downhill. From the measurements, appreciable adverse effect of machine tillage was recorded when moving downhill. Machine movement against the slope cannot be understood as a corrective step in view of tillage erosion against the movement of the machine from the slope.