Crop rotations in a climate change scenario: short-term effects of crop diversity on resilience and ecosystem service provision under drought

Degani, Erika; Leigh, Samuel; Barber, Henry; Jones, Hannah; Lukáč, Martin; Sutton, Peter; Potts, Simon G.

doi:10.1016/j.agee.2019.106625

Cited by 86 publications

(44 citation statements)

References 52 publications

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“…We report a novel rainout shelter design for drought experiments that combines the slatted design used in lower stature systems such as grassland, deserts (Yahdjian and Sala, 2002;Gherardi and Sala, 2013), and wheat (Kundel et al, 2018) with the taller (≥2 m) height of fully covered rainout shelters used previously in maize (Steward et al, 2019) and wheat (Degani et al, 2019). Our rainout shelter design successfully reduced soil moisture without creating crop microenvironment artifacts such as higher air temperature, relative humidity, or vapor pressure deficit (Figures 2B-D).…”

Section: Novel Tall Slatted Rainout Shelter With Few Crop Microenviromentioning

confidence: 97%

“…However, roof slats are often made of relatively expensive transparent acrylic bands (Yahdjian and Sala, 2002;Kundel et al, 2018). Other studies use more economical but less durable greenhouse plastic fully covered rainout shelter roofs with impacts on air temperature and crop microenvironment (Degani et al, 2019;Steward et al, 2019). We highlight our use of transparent corrugated polycarbonate roofing material as more economical than acrylic and sturdier than greenhouse plastic.…”

Section: Novel Tall Slatted Rainout Shelter With Few Crop Microenviromentioning

confidence: 97%

“…We acknowledge the limitations of above-canopy rainout shelters in terms of the confounding of rainfall interception and light interception and potential impacts on yield [unless controlled for with additional rainout shelters without rainfall interception (Kundel et al, 2018)]. However, we note that rainout shelter impacts on light are often not reported (Degani et al, 2019;Steward et al, 2019) or are reported as roof material manufacturer specifications (Kundel et al, 2018) but not measured in the field. Also, despite our study being conducted over one season, we note the value of rainout shelter experiments for controlled manipulation of rainfall, effectively isolating the impact of drought in terms of rainfall amount while holding rainfall timing and other weather and sources of variation constant.…”

Section: Novel Tall Slatted Rainout Shelter With Few Crop Microenviromentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Diversification of maize cropping systems, both in time and space, provides opportunities to decrease vulnerability and improve drought resilience through ecological intensification and production of more diverse food products (Lin, 2011;Altieri et al, 2015;Bullock et al, 2017;Degani et al, 2019;Steward et al, 2019). A resilient agroecosystem shows greater interannual yield stability due to higher resistance to stress or faster recovery after stress (Urruty et al, 2016;Peterson et al, 2018).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…We investigated how intercropping impacts whole-system vulnerability to drought, in terms of crop and whole-system grain and nutritional yields and drought-induced yield losses, by excluding rainfall using rainout shelters at a field trial in semi-arid Tanzania. Rain exclusion systems have proven useful in assessing how agroecosystem resilience is affected by management practices in different agroecosystems (Degani et al, 2019;Steward et al, 2019). Such rainout shelters are particularly useful for testing practices with impacts that may emerge over years to even decades, and, as such, remain difficult to test at several sites along a rainfall gradient.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Maize-Pigeonpea Intercropping Outperforms Monocultures Under Drought

Renwick

Kimaro

Hafner

et al. 2020

Front. Sustain. Food Syst.

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There is an urgent need to develop resilient agroecosystems capable of helping smallholder farmers adapt to climate change, particularly drought. In East Africa, diversification of maize-based cropping systems by intercropping with grain and tree legumes may foster productivity and resilience to adverse weather conditions. We tested whether intercropping enhances drought resistance and crop and whole-system yields by imposing drought in monocultures and additive intercrops along a crop diversity gradient—sole maize (Zea mays), sole pigeonpea (Cajanus cajan), maize-pigeonpea, maize-gliricidia (Gliricidia sepium, a woody perennial), and maize-pigeonpea-gliricidia—with and without fertilizer application. We developed and tested a novel low-cost, above-canopy rainout shelter design for drought experiments made with locally-sourced materials that successfully reduced soil moisture without creating sizeable artifacts for the crop microenvironment. Drought reduced maize grain yield under fertilized conditions in some cropping systems but did not impact pigeonpea grain yield. Whole-system grain yield and theoretical caloric and protein yields in two intercropping systems, maize-pigeonpea and maize-gliricidia, were similar to the standard sole maize system. Maize-pigeonepea performed most strongly compared to other systems in terms of protein yield. Maize-pigeonpea was the only intercrop that consistently required less land than its corresponding monocultures to produce the same yield (Land Equivalent Ratio >1), particularly under drought. Despite intercropping systems having greater planting density than sole maize and theoretically greater competition for water, they were not more prone to yield loss with drought. Our results show that maize-pigeonpea intercropping provides opportunities to produce the same food on less land under drought and non-drought conditions, without compromising drought resistance of low-input smallholder maize systems.

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Section: Novel Tall Slatted Rainout Shelter With Few Crop Microenviromentioning

confidence: 97%

Section: Novel Tall Slatted Rainout Shelter With Few Crop Microenviromentioning

confidence: 97%

Section: Novel Tall Slatted Rainout Shelter With Few Crop Microenviromentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 3 more Smart Citations

Maize-Pigeonpea Intercropping Outperforms Monocultures Under Drought

Renwick

Kimaro

Hafner

et al. 2020

Front. Sustain. Food Syst.

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New approach combining food value with nutrient budgeting provides insights into the value of alternative farming systems

Willoughby

Topp

Hallett

et al. 2022

Food and Energy Security

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Diverse perennial circular forage systems are needed to foster resilience, ecosystem services, and socioeconomic benefits in agricultural landscapes

et al. 2022

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Prevailing agricultural systems dominated by annual crop monocultures, and the landscapes that contain them, lack resilience and multifunctionality. They are vulnerable to extreme weather events, contribute to degradation of soil, water, and air quality, reduce biodiversity, and negatively impact human health, social engagement, and equity. To achieve greater resilience, stability, and multiple ecosystem services therein, and to improve socioeconomic outcomes, we propose a practical framework to gain multifunctionality at multiple scales. This framework includes forages within agroecosystems that have the essential structural features of diversity, perenniality, and circularity. These three structural features are associated with increased resilience, stability, and provision of several ecosystem services, which in turn improve human health and socioeconomic outcomes. This framework improves understanding of, and access to, tools and materials for promoting the adoption of diverse circular agroecosystems with perennial forages. Application of this framework can result in land transformations that solve sustainability challenges in agriculture if policy, economic, and social barriers can be overcome by a transdisciplinary process of equitable knowledge production.

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Crop rotations in a climate change scenario: short-term effects of crop diversity on resilience and ecosystem service provision under drought

Cited by 86 publications

References 52 publications

Maize-Pigeonpea Intercropping Outperforms Monocultures Under Drought

Maize-Pigeonpea Intercropping Outperforms Monocultures Under Drought

New approach combining food value with nutrient budgeting provides insights into the value of alternative farming systems

Diverse perennial circular forage systems are needed to foster resilience, ecosystem services, and socioeconomic benefits in agricultural landscapes

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