Preliminary study on the effect of certain weeds control strategies on the seed bank of the soil

Abstract

Regular studies of soil seed bank can give a lot of information about different weed species that persist in experimental fields, and help in planning of different weed management strategies. In this work, two field experiments in a randomized complete block design (RCBD) were carried out at Giza Farm Station that located at Giza governorate, Egypt, to evaluate the effect of certain weed control strategies on the weeds' species seed bank in the soil during the summer season of the years 2021 and 2022. To determine all weed species in the soil seed bank, both emergence method and extracted seeds method were used. Obtained results indicated that emergence method has recorded less seedling number than those of seed extraction method, and horizontals distribution of soil seed bank at zero time, showed high significance at (p ≥ 0.01) between the experiments' replicates for most weed species and their total, while vertical distribution of soil seed bank showed no significantly differences between the two depth of 5 and 15 cm for all weed species except those of Setaria virids and Ipomia eriocarpa. Finally, the implemented strategy based on applying pre and post herbicides and mechanical at same sequence during the two successive summer seasons has reduced significantly the soil seed banks of all identified weed species and their total.