Effects of six primary tillage implements on energy inputs and residue cover in Central Italy

Abstract

The use of agricultural machinery represents the main aspect contributing to the total energy input in the agricultural system. The study evaluated the energy requirements and the work quality of two conventional (threefurrow plough and spading machine) and of four conservation implements (rotary harrow, subsoiler, disk harrow, combined cultivator) for mediumdeep primary tillage in a silty-clay soil, widespread in Central Italy. The tests were carried out with the aim of selecting the most energy-efficient implement. Working speed, force of traction, fuel consumption and energy demands were measured, using a 205 kW instrumented tractor. Cloddiness and roughness of the tilled soil, biomass coverage index and burying degree were evaluated. The conservation tillage implements gave the best results in fuel consumption and energy requirements respect to the conventional implements, with energy savings up to 86% in the case of disk harrow. The rotary harrow showed intermediate values and the best soil refinement. Among the conservation implements, the disk harrow showed the best performance on biomass coverage index (43.8%), while the combined cultivator showed the highest value of biomass burying (87.8%) and the best performance on fuel consumption per hour (25.8 kg h -1 ). IntroductionPrimary tillage represents the major soil manipulation and the required implements can be utilised both in conventional and conservation tillage systems. Conventional tillage systems may produce undesirable effects, such as worsening of soil structure due to compaction, loss of nutrients in deeper layers and of organic matter in upper depths (Lal, 2004), increasing soil erosion caused by wind or by surface runoff (De Laune and Sij, 2012), excessive energy requirements and costs (Perfect et al., 1997). These effects can be reduced, especially in compact clay soil, by replacing conventional implements with soil conservation tillage equipment, to reduce the number of passes, the working depth, the fuel consumption and the energy input (Raper and Bergtold, 2007;Fanigliulo and Pochi, 2011), by using one pass implements with wider working width and equipped with suitable geometry working tools (Godwin, 2007).The availability of data on energy requirement, fuel consumption and force of traction of tillage implements is the main factor to determine the power class of the required tractor (Moitzi et al., 2013;Pochi et al., 2013) and to estimate the effects of different implements in relation to the quality of the tillage in specific soil types, in terms of depth of tillage, soil cloddiness and crop residue or biomass cover (Raper et al., 2000;Chen et al., 2004;Sahu and Raheman, 2006).Studies on conventional and reduced tillage in scientific literature have provided a large amount of information on methods, labour and energy in different soil conditions (Al Suhaibani and Al-Janobi, 1997;Arvidsson et al., 2004;Wandkar et al., 2013), but only a few gave a comprehensive picture of the energy request and of the quality of tillage for the mos...

The Application of an Unmanned Aerial System and Machine Learning Techniques for Red Clover-Grass Mixture Yield Estimation under Variety Performance Trials

“…On the other hand, a study confirmed that a biomass coverage index of 43.8% represents the best performance of disking operations [76]. Similarly in our study, a higher DM of 2YC red clover in DP treatment was observed (Figure 5b) and could be accurately predicted.…”

Conventional and Conservation Seedbed Preparation Systems for Wheat Planting in Silty-Clay Soil

“…In Italy, the most common conventional method adopted in silty-clay soils to prepare the seedbed is based on the chopping (rarely the burning) of the residues from previous crops, on a deep ploughing (0.30-0.40 m) aimed at burying the residues [8], and on Sustainability 2021, 13, 6506 2 of 19 secondary tillage by means of machines with working tools operated by the tractor's Power Take-Off (PTO), such as power harrow or rotary tiller [9,10]. Unwanted effects of such methods can be excessive energy requirements [11], and related costs [12], due to high PTO torque needed to drive the rotors, worsening of soil structure due to compaction which leaves the soil susceptible to crusting and affects plant growth and yield, loss of nutrients in deeper layers, mineralization of organic matter in upper layers, increasing soil erosion caused by wind and runoff [13]. Moreover, much research has shown that high working speed and deep tillage results in greater tractor's CO 2 emissions [14,15], due to high fuel consumption [16], and favourable conditions for microbiological activity created by the deep tillage [17].…”

Assessment of the Performance of Agricultural Tires Using a Mobile Test Bench

“…The most severe traction conditions for agricultural tires depend on the characteristics of the ground surface and generally occur in the interval 0 to 2.8 m s −1 (for example in primary soil tillage) and decrease for increasing velocities [36,37]. The tests were carried out within this interval.…”