Electronic Journal of Polish Agricultural Universities (EJPAU) founded by all Polish Agriculture Universities presents original papers and review articles relevant to all aspects of agricultural sciences. It is target for persons working both in science and industry,regulatory agencies or teaching in agricultural sector. Covered by IFIS Publishing (Food Science and Technology Abstracts), ELSEVIER Science - Food Science and Technology Program, CAS USA (Chemical Abstracts), CABI Publishing UK and ALPSP (Association of Learned and Professional Society Publisher - full membership). Presented in the Master List of Thomson ISI.
2008
Volume 11
Issue 1
Topic:
Agricultural Engineering
ELECTRONIC
JOURNAL OF
POLISH
AGRICULTURAL
UNIVERSITIES
Głąb T. 2008. DYNAMIC OF DACTYLIS GLOMERATA GROWTH UNDER TRACTOR TRAFFIC CONDITIONS, EJPAU 11(1), #06.
Available Online: http://www.ejpau.media.pl/volume11/issue1/art-06.html

DYNAMIC OF DACTYLIS GLOMERATA GROWTH UNDER TRACTOR TRAFFIC CONDITIONS

Tomasz Głąb
Department of Machinery Exploitation, Ergonomics and Agronomy Fundamentals, Agricultural University of Cracow, Poland

 

ABSTRACT

Utilization of multi-cutting grass is connected with multiple passes of equipment what involve deleterious effect on the growth of plants and results in decrease the productivity. A three year study was conducted on silty loam Mollic Fluvisol covered by Dactylis glomerata. The multiple passes (2, 4 and 6) were applied in comparison with untreated object. Height of plants was measured once a week and dry matter yields were established three times a year. The obtained results indicated that the regrowth of Dactylis glomerata consisted of three phases differ in their growth dynamic. The tractor traffic affected the speed of growth in adversely proportion to number of passes. However, this effect was significantly determined only during the first phase of growth. The growth moderation of Dactylis glomerata according to tractor traffic results in decrease in DM yields. DM production decreased according to an increase in number of tractor passes.

Key words: Dactylis glomerata, height, yields, tractor traffic.

INTRODUCTION

The soil compaction problems have recently increased in forage crops as a result of frequent and usually heavy vehicle traffic. Many researches agree that the yields of most forage plants are affected adversely by tractor traffic. It is a serious problem for perennial crops, particularly perennial forage grasses, where the soil is wheeled without ever being loosened [6,10,11,14]. The tractor passes result in unfavorable changes of soil properties. Soil compaction leads to soil structure degradation, what is strongly associated with changes in physical properties of soil like porosity, bulk density and penetration resistance [2,5,13,20]. The degraded soil physical environment due to compaction influences not only shoots but also roots growth and development. Soil compaction increases mechanical impendence, creates unfavourable growing conditions for roots and restricts oxygen, water and nutrients supply [3,4,15]. Not only changes in physical properties of soil but also physical damages to above ground parts of sward plants are responsible for yield decrease [10,18]. These damages are reported as more important in decreasing the plant yield than soil compaction [16].

On the other hand, it is also reported that yields of perennial plants are not always reduced by compaction and sometimes are larger in compacted soil than in non-compacted [8,12]. The presence of high organic matter content, a root mass and stable structure in the surface layers of soil under perennial crops may mitigate the adverse effects of wheel traffic [6]. The impact of soil compaction depends on some factors and it varies in different climate and soil condition. It is also reported that plant reaction changes during the season and it is different for particular regrowths [18,23]. The problem of perennials yield response to tractor traffic seems to be more complex than in annual crops production.

In Poland the most popular method of harvest conservation is hay production using the surface of the meadow (more than 60% of total herbage production) [21]. Although the new silage technologies appeared (bales, tubes etc.) hay making is still popular method of conserving grass in Poland mainly due to low expenses and favourable climate condition. However, one of the great disadvantages of this method is very intensive tractor traffic connected with operation like cutting, tedding, raking, lifting and fertilizing.

The aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of multiple tractor passes on Dactylis glomerata productivity with special focus on growth dynamic in particular regrowth terms.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

This study was conducted as field experiment located in Mydlniki near Krakow at the Department of Machinery Exploitation, Ergonomics and Agronomy Fundamentals, Agricultural University of Krakow. The climate of experimental site, south of Poland, is temperate. Data from the meteorological station located at the site are presented in Table 1.

Table 1. Monthly average temperature and sum of precipitation (Kraków-Balice meteorological station)
 

1996

1997

1998

Monthly average temperature,
°C

January

-6.1

-6.5

-0.1

February

-5.7

1.1

3.2

March

-2.1

2.8

2.3

April

7.3

5.2

10.5

May

14.9

14.6

14.2

June

17.3

17.4

18.4

July

16.7

17.6

18.6

August

17.5

18.1

17.6

September

10.3

13.0

13.5

October

9.1

6.4

8.0

November

5.6

3.4

-0.3

December

-6.1

0.4

-2.7

Annual Mean

6.6

7.8

8.6

Sum of precipitation, mm

January

27

17

46

February

18

50

44

March

24

21

36

April

58

36

82

May

147

65

48

June

57

91

113

July

70

285

58

August

160

49

66

September

102

56

52

October

23

68

98

November

49

54

38

December

13

35

28

Annual Sum

748

827

709

The field experiment was located on silty loam Mollic Fluvisol (FAO, 1998). Some characteristics of the soil are presented in Table 2. The soil before trafficking was ploughed and harrowed in 1995 due to seedbed preparation then the Dactylis glomerata seeds were sown at rate of 25 kg ha-1. Fertilization in annual rate of 120 kg N ha-1, 60 kg K2O ha-1 and 72 kg P2O5 ha-1 was applied in spring and after the first and second cut. Experimental plots were established in randomised blocky design with four replications, with a plot area of 9 m2. Five compaction treatments were applied by tractor using a following range of number of passes: (P0) control without tractor traffic, (P1) one pass, (P2) two passes, (P4) four passes and (P6) six passes completely covering plots surface. The URSUS C-360 tractor of 2056 kg weight was used for traffic simulation. The technical characteristic of URSUS C-360 is presented in Table 3. The multiple passes were applied up to one week after every harvest in wheel-beside-wheel design, three times a year. The term of tractor passes correspond to the beginning of plant regrowth phase before the shooting phase. The wheel tracking treatments were designed to simulate potential combinations of field operations from cutting, tedding, lifting and fertilizing. These operations are strictly connected with the technology of hay production using the surface of the meadow and they start with cutting and last couple of days up to fertilizing. The wheeling was applied at soil moisture content of approximately 0.30 cm-3 cm-3 (±0.02 cm-3 cm-3). This water content corresponded to the value of a field water capacity.

Table 2. Soil characteristics of Mollic Fluvisol soil at the experimental field

pH (KCl), -

6.5

Total organic C, g kg-1

25.8

Total N, g kg-1

2.10

C/N, -

12.3

Solid particle density, g cm-3

2.53

Reference bulk density, g cm-3

1.65

Sand, g kg-1

290

Silt, g kg-1

670

Clay, g kg-1

40

Texture

Silty loam

Table 3. Selected technical parameters of URSUS C-360

Parameter

Unit

Value

Weight

kg

2056

Power

kW

35

Front-wheel tires

cal

6.00-16

Back-wheel tires

cal

14.9-28

Unit pressure of front-wheels

kPa

168.6a

Unit pressure of back-wheels

kPa

61.1a

Air pressure of front wheels

kPa

150

Air pressure of back wheels

kPa

100

a – unit pressure according to Walczyk [22] following Soane [20]

A height of plants was measured once a week from the beginning of April to the end of September. This measurement was done using falling-plate-meter method [1,9,19]. This method, also known as grassmeter, is non-destructive technique usually used for estimating the herbage mass of grazing perennials swards [17]. The plate used in this investigation was 46.7 g in weight with an area of 0.04 m2 (Fig. 1).

Fig. 1. The plate of grassmeter used for measuring the height of plants

Harvesting was done three times a year in May, July and September. Herbage mass was determined on each plot based on grass herbage cut with an Agria mower (Typ 3200, Agria-Werke GmbH, Germany). The dry matter (DM) of the yield was determined by drying a subsample of 500 g at 70°C to a constant weight.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

During the experiment three harvests were obtained every year. The growth of Dactylis glomerata between the particular harvests was characterized by three clearly identified phases: (i) the slow growth at the beginning of growing period, when daily growth was below 0.5 cm day-1; (ii) very intensive growth, the daily growth was above 0.5 cm day-1 and it increase very rapidly; (iii) the growth slowed down, the daily growth was still high at the beginning but it decreased (Fig. 2 and 3). These three phases were noticed during all three regrowths. However, they were particularly clearly identified at the spring, before the first harvest. The slow growth of the first phase was probably a result of damages to plant during the harvest. Plants usually needed two or three weeks to regenerate the damages and injuries caused by harvester. Then very intensive growth began when daily growth was even higher than 4 cm day-1 at the first regrowth. It was connected with interstitial elongation and it finished when flowers appear.

Fig. 2. Effect of tractor traffic on the height of Dactylis glomerata. Average of three years, 1996-1998

Fig. 3. Effect of tractor traffic on the daily growth of Dactylis glomerata. Average of three years, 1996-1998

The growth of Dactylis glomerata at spring were not significantly affected by different number of wheel passes applied to plots. However, the second and the third regrowth were influenced by multiple passes. This effect was noticed only in the thirst phase of regrowth. Plants strongly compacted by tractor wheels needed more than three weeks to cure injuries and the beginning of second phase of regrowth was delayed. The Figs. 4-8 present appearance of the experimental plots after the tractor traffic treatment (pictures taken two weeks after wheeling at the first phase of regrowth). The second and the third phase of growth were characterized by similar progress. These changes in dynamic of daily growth resulted in the final height of plants. The heights of plants before the second cut were 39 cm at the P0 treatment and 37, 35, 33 and 32 cm at P1, P2, P4 and P6, respectively. The similar effect was observed before the third cut, where height of 23, 19, 19, 17 and 16cm were noticed at P0, P1, P2, P4 and P6 treatment, respectively. At the first cut there were no significant differences between the heights of plants (91 cm on average). Zhezmer et al. [23] confirmed the decrease in plant growth caused by tractor wheeling particularly when bunch grasses were compacted. Dactylis glomerata, as bunch grass, considerably suffered from compaction with respect to rhizomatous grasses.

Fig. 4. The experimental plot of the P0 treatment (control, without compaction). two weeks after the first harvest Fig. 5. The experimental plot of the P1 treatment (one pass of URSUS C-360) two weeks after the tractor traffic

Fig. 6. The experimental plot of the P2 treatment (two passes of URSUS C-360) two weeks after the tractor traffic Fig. 7. The experimental plot of the P4 treatment (four passes of URSUS C-360) two weeks after the tractor traffic

Fig. 8. The experimental plot of the P6 treatment (six passes of URSUS C-360) two weeks after the tractor traffic

Table 4. Dry matter yields of Dactylis glomerata. Average of three years 1996-1998

Treatments

DM production, t ha-1

1st cut

2nd cut

3rd cut

Total annual

P0

8.00

4.43

2.57

15.00

P1

8.18

3.93

2.29

14.41

P2

8.01

3.63

2.22

13.86

P4

7.21

2.93

1.82

11.96

P6

7.04

2.64

1.83

11.51

LSD0.05

n.s.

0.43

0.39

 

The results in the height of plants were strictly connected with DM yields (Table 4). The thirst harvest was 7.7 t DM ha-1 on average and there were no differences between treatments. During the second and the third harvest wheel traffic decreased DM yields. The DM yield at P6 object was approximately only 60% with respect to P0 for the second harvest and 71% for the third harvest, respectively. This decrease in plant production according to multiple passes was confirmed by results obtained by Frame and Merilles [11] for ryegrass swards. Douglas and Crawford [7] reported that relation between plant yields and soil compaction varied during vegetation period and some differences between particular regrowths were noticeable.

CONCLUSIONS

  1. The regrowth of Dactylis glomerata consists of three phases differ in the growth dynamic. The first phase is characterized by the slow growth, the second with a very intensive growth and the third when the growth slows down.

  2. The tractor traffic affects the speed of growth in adversely proportion to number of passes. This effect is significantly determined only during the first phase of growth.

  3. The growth moderation of Dactylis glomerata according to tractor traffic results in decrease in dry matter yields. DM production decreased according to increase in number of tractor passes.


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Accepted for print: 23.10.2007


Tomasz Głąb
Department of Machinery Exploitation,
Ergonomics and Agronomy Fundamentals,
Agricultural University of Cracow, Poland
Mjra Łupaszki 6, 31-198 Cracow, Poland
email: rtglab@cyf-kr.edu.pl

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