Do different soil use and management systems change root weight?

ABSTRACT

The objective to examine the effect of management systems on root dry weight, the percentage distribution of root weight in the soil profile, and the soil carbon content. Treatments consisted of 13 management systems established 22 years ago: degraded pasture; continuous pasture, fertilised, and intercropped with a legume species; continuous pasture with fertilisation; continuous pasture without fertilisation; pasture for four years followed by soybean cropping for four years; pasture for four years followed by soybean cropping for four years, with eucalyptus; soybean cropping for four years followed by pasture for four years; soybean cropping for four years followed by pasture for four years, with eucalyptus; soybean cropping for one year followed by pasture for three years; soybean cropping for one year followed by pasture for three years; continuous summer soybean cropping under conventional cultivation; continuous summer soybean cropping under conservation farming; and continuous no-till summer soybean cropping. Except for degraded pastures, pasture systems have higher root dry mass than soybean cropping systems. The integrated production systems increase the dry weight of the roots, and the carbon content of the soil and reduce aluminum saturation and soil acidity. The highest percentages of roots are found in the 0–0.10 m range.

KEYWORDS:

• Crop-livestock-forest integration
• crop-livestock integration
• organic matter
• pasture
• root system

Acknowledgments

Thanks are due to the Coordination for the Improvement of Higher Education Personnel – Brazil (CAPES) – Finance Code 001; the Federal University of Mato Grosso do Sul and Embrapa Beef Cattle for financial support; and the National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (process no. 150305/2022-2).

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by CAPES [grant number 001]; CNPQ [grant number 150305/2022-2].