Effect of mulching with maize straw on water infiltration and soil loss at different initial soil moistures in a rainfall simulation

Abstract

Mulching and soil water content (SWC) have a significant impact on soil erosion, and this study investigated the effect of straw mulching on water infiltration and soil loss under different initial SWC treatments in a rainfall simulation experiment conducted in northern China. Increasing initial SWC can decrease soil infiltration and increase soil loss. During an 80 mm rainfall event (80 mm·h⁻¹ for 60 min), 8%, 12% and 16% initial SWC treatments decreased cumulative infiltration by 8.7%, 42.5% and 58.1%, and increased total sediment yield by 44, 146 and 315 g, respectively, compared to 4% initial SWC. However, in all the straw mulching treatments, there was no significant difference in stable infiltration rate between the different initial SWC treatments. For all initial SWC treatments, straw mulching of 30% or more significantly enhanced water infiltration by over 31% and reduced soil loss by over 49%, compared to the unmulched treatment. Taking into consideration the performance of no-till planters, a maize straw mulching rate of 30% to 60% (1400–3100 kg·hm⁻²) is recommended for the conservation of water and soil in northern China.

Keywords

infiltration / initial soil water content / rainfall simulation / soil loss / straw mulching

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by Changjiang Scholars and Innovative Research Team in University of China (IRT13039), and Special Fund for Agro-scientific Research in the Public Interest (201503136).

Compliance with ethics guidelines

Yifu Zhang, Hongwen Li, Jin He, Qingjie Wang, Ying Chen, Wanzhi Chen and Shaochun Ma declare that they have no conflict of interest or financial conflicts to disclose.

This article does not contain any studies with human or animal subjects performed by any of the authors.

RIGHTS & PERMISSIONS

The Author(s) 2016. Published by Higher Education Press. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0)