The influence of direct sowing methods on the growth and productivity of spring barley in the conditions of the north-eastern part of Ukraine

Abstract

The article presents the results of studies to determine the efficiency of growing spring barley depending on the methods of direct sowing in technology, which is based on the use of combined machines. It is proved that due to the use of a direct sowing seeder, the sections of which consist of modules for local loosening of the soil, in front of the openers of which wavy discs are installed, the grain yield increases on average by 20 % compared to the control. Moving at high speed, the wavy discs loosen relatively narrow soil strips into which the seeds are laid by the openers, this makes it possible to more efficiently retain moisture, which subsequently significantly affects the dynamics of seedlings and the yield level of spring barley grain. The smallest weed infestation of crops was in the case of sowing with a seeder with combined cutting-type working bodies and disc coulter systems with support-press wheels. Weeds were counted after the emergence of barley seedlings. The greatest soil hardness was observed when using a seeder with disc working bodies, the sections of which consist of modules for local loosening of the soil. Statistical processing of the data indicates that depth has the greatest effect on soil hardness, its influence accounted for 96 %. The force of impact on soil hardness of sowing methods was 0.76 %. The density of the soil in the zone of development of the root system of plants in all variants of the experiment did not go beyond the optimum. Before harvesting, the moisture content of the upper soil layers in variants with direct sowing was 3–5 % higher, and the moisture content of the lower layers was less by 1–2 % than in the control (the reliability of the data was determined using Fisher's criterion and was 95 %, and the difference between experimental options was significant). Key words: yield of barley, sowing, method, technologies, seeders, quality, local loosening.