Impacts on the yield and water use efficiency of wheat and maize under Spring-irrigation and straw mulching in Haihe Plain
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DOI:10.7606/j.issn.1000-7601.2018.02.05
Key Words: straw mulching  water use efficiency  wheat-maize double cropping system  grain yield
Author NameAffiliation
ZHENG Yuan-yuan College of Agronomy, Agricultural University of Hebei, Baoding, Hebei 071000, China 
WANG Gui-yan College of Agronomy, Agricultural University of Hebei, Baoding, Hebei 071000, China 
ZHANG Jian-heng College of Agronomy, Agricultural University of Hebei, Baoding, Hebei 071000, China 
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Abstract:
      Water scarcity in Haihe plain has a serious impact on water utilization and growth of wheat-maize double cropping system. To investigate the effects of spring-irrigation and straw-mulching on the crop growth, yield and water utilization of wheat and maize, four field-experiment treatments, Spring-no-irrigation, Spring-no-irrigation/straw-mulching, Spring-irrigation once, and Spring-irrigation once/straw-mulching were carried out in 2013—2015. The results showed that, irrigation and straw-mulching had significant impacts on the crop during jointing-flowering stage of wheat. Due to preservation of soil moisture and soil temperature by straw-mulching during this stage, the LAI value with Spring-irrigation once/straw-mulching treatment scores significantly was higher than the Spring-irrigation once treatment. But the effects then gradually disappeared after flowering stage. The straw-mulching treatment had a significantly lower LAI value than no-straw-mulching treatment after 10 and 20 days from flowering. With or without straw-mulching, the LAI values with Spring-no-irrigation treatments were similar, probably due to the water stress. Compared with no-straw-mulching treatment, the yield of wheat decreased by 1.46% under Spring-no-irrigation and decreased 2.76% under Spring-irrigation in 2013—2014. Separately, the decreases were 2.78% and 1.11% in 2015. The Spring-irrigation once and no-irrigation treatments had a significant difference in crop yields in 2014, but not in 2015.With the increasing level of irrigation, the soil water consumption amount decreased. The soil water consumption in wheat growing was greatly increased with no-irrigation treatment in spring than Spring-irrigation once treatment in the two years. No-straw-mulching had greater soil water consumption than straw-mulching treatment, though the difference was not significant. Together with the rainfall effect during maize growth, the effect caused a less soil water consumption with straw-mulching treatment than no mulching. For the water-use efficiency, wheat, maize and all the treatments in different years had no significant difference.Our results indicated that, straw-mulching guaranteed crop yield by decreasing soil water consumption during wheat water-sensitive stage under limited irrigation condition due to water scarcity in Haihe plain. The combination of spring-irrigation once with straw-mulching was very effective for water-saving wheat-maize double cropping system in the region.