Soil Physical Attributes in Long-Term Soil Management Systems (Tillage and No-till)

Abstract

The period of implantation of the no-tillage system (NTS) is a fundamental factor to the dimension of the changes that occur to the soil's physical, chemical and biological attributes. Thus, the objective of this study was to evaluate the soil changes to the physical attributes and correlate the results to the soil organic matter in areas of different long-term soil management. The study was set as a completely randomised design, in a 4 × 4 factorial scheme, with four management systems [5 years NTS (NTS5); 17 years NTS (NTS17); conventional tillage system for 20 years (CTS20); native area (NA)], and four soil depths (0-0.05, 0.05-0.1, 0.1-0.2, 0.2-0.4 m), with five repetitions. Soil mechanical resistance to root penetration (RP), bulk density (SD), volumetric moisture (VM), macro (Ma), microporosity (Mi) and total porosity (TP), and the aggregation parameters were evaluated. The CTS20, NTS5 and NTS17 presented superior SD in the most superficial soil layers, which was not yet causing resistance to root development. The SD was the only physical attribute that correlated significantly with all the other soil attributes evaluated, indicating the importance of such attribute to evaluate soil quality to crops. The soil physical attributes found in the Cerrado native area followed the sequence of similarities: no-tillage system with 17 years (most similar), with five years and the conventional tillage system (less similar). The changes caused by the anthropic activity in the soil's physical attributes are more pronounced and perceptible in soil depths up to 0.2 m.