Effects of Puddling Types and Rice Establishment Methods on Soil Characteristics and Productivity of Rice in Southern China

Abstract

Puddling is an important operation to minimize soil nutrient leaching and thereby increasing the availability of plant nutrients and achieving reduced soil condition. Good puddle field conditions are needed to create a favorable environment for normal growth of rice plants. However, long-term effects of puddling could lead to forms of large clods in fine textured soils, resulting in negative effect on the soil characteristics, preventing seed-soil contacts, and leading to decline in rice yield. This study was conducted in 2 years with treatment including puddling the land twice with moldboard plow and pregerminated seeds were hill-seeded with direct seeding machine (PD), puddling the land twice with rotary tiller and pregerminated seeds were hill-seeded with direct seeding machine (RD), puddling the land twice with moldboard plow and 15-day-old seedlings were hill-transplanted with transplant machine (PT), and puddling the land twice with rotary tiller and 15-day-old seedlings were hill-transplanted with transplant machine (RT) to assess the effects of puddling and rice establishment method on soil characteristics and rice yield. Results revealed significant improvement in the bulk density and increase in SOC, N, P, and K in PD. The maximum microbial population was found in PD. Rice grain yield showed a higher productivity increase of 7.65 t·ha−2 (31.25%) and 3.93 t·ha−2 (13.91%) for 1H and 2H (1H: 1st harvest and 2H: 2nd harvest), respectively, in PD compared with the lowest of 5.76 t·ha−1 and 3.45 t·ha−1 in 1H and 2H, respectively, under RT. Overall, PD was found to be the most suitable puddling type and rice establishment method for soil improvement and increasing rice yield.

Crop establishment methods and herbicide mixtures induced weed dynamics, productivity, and profitability of summer rice

“…The anaerobic conditions created by puddling inhibited the germination and growth of many weed species reducing the crop-weed competition which eventually favored growth and productivity in rice. This finding is supported by the result found by many investigators, where it was found that regardless of weed management practices, the crop growth and yield were comparable between TPR and WSR [15][16][17][18][19]. The weed species observed in this experiment align with the findings reported by various scientists working in different agro-climatic zones across the country under typical conditions, as documented in previous studies [20][21][22].…”

Effect of tillage and land levelling practices on productivity of transplanted rice: A case study in canal command area of north western plateau agro-climatic zone

“…indicating various degrees of soil compaction in farmer's field. Decrease in bulk density due to puddling has also been reported by many researchers (Rezaei et al 2012;Obalum et al 2014;Asenso et al 2022). At subsequent observations, the bulk density increased and reached to 1.71, 1.80 and 1.61 in 0 -15 cm layer and 1.78, 1.82 and 1.66 in 15 -30 cm soil layer in case of T , T and T , an 1 2 3 increase of 33.59, 63.63, 21.96 % and 39.06, 65.45, 25.75 % under surface and sub-surface layers, respectively.…”

“…The puddling has been reported to increase the yield of rice by many authors (Obalum et al 2014;Kalita et al 2020;Asenso et al 2022), others have opined that puddling may not be necessary as it has little effect on rice yields (Kirchhof et al 2000;Evangelista et al 2014;Ebrahimi et al 2022). (Fujihara et al 2013) reported that the practice even could not increase the duration of standing water over the field and found that pond water disappeared more quickly in puddled field than nonpuddled field.…”

Assessing the Influence of Soil Physical Properties on the Puddling Quality: A Comprehensive Review

“…Additionally, there is an observed rise in inter-domain pores and inter-micro aggregates. The study underscores the impact of puddling on soil structure and provides insight into the mechanisms contributing to the observed changes in bulk density [78].An experiment revealed a significant decrease in soil bulk density, particularly at a depth of 30 cm, when employing moldboard ploughing in conjunction with direct seeding [12]. The soil bulk density values, ranging from 1.6 -1.8 cm -3 at a depth of 20 -25 cm, contrasted with 1.4 -1.5 g cm -3 at the surface layer (0 to 12 cm), suggesting the presence of a plough pan in these soils [5].But Mathew et al state that the Surface of soil in no-till and conventional-till handling exhibited lesser bulk density than the subsurface of the soil, with no serious variation observed between the two methods of tillage [54].…”