ASSESSMENT OF SOIL AND WATER CONSERVATION POTENTIAL OF DIFFERENT FORAGE GRASSES UNDER SEMI-ARID CONDITION
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Date
2018-07
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Indira Gandhi Krishi Vishwavidyalaya, Raipur
Abstract
Present investigations entitled “Assessment of Soil and Water Conservation Potential of Different Forage Grasses under Semi-Arid Condition” aimed to be identified the best forage grass for soil and water conservation perspective out of this research. The huge area of Central India comes under semi-arid condition and is ravine affected. This study help to stabilize those degraded land which can be recovered for agricultural use. The experiment was carried out during the year 2017-2018 at the research farm of Farm Machinery & Post Harvest Technology Division, ICAR-Indian Grassland and Fodder Research Institute (IGFRI), Jhansi. Analysis of physical properties of soil of experimental plots showed lowest bulk densityin C. ciliaris(1.76 g/cc) and highest in bare land (2.10 g/cc). The lowest porosity was observed in bareland (14%) and highest in TSH (29%). All the grasses have shown higher infiltration capacity rate than bareland. The number of slots is designed to be 9 in that rectangular channel section of multislot divisors to successfully measure expected runoff. Five artificial rainfall events were carried out using sprinkler set in three days. Total amount of simulated rainfall received was noted to be 171.60 mm. It is revealed that the highest runoff was observed in bareland(46.1mm) and the lowest in D.annulatum (21.49mm). Data referring to overland flow indicate that grasses had a significant effect on flow reduction. Highest soil loss of 0.662 t ha-1 was observed in bareland while lowest soil loss of 0.135 t ha-1 was observed in D. annulatum. From bareland, the total losses of NPK from five rainfall events were 120.86 kg ha-1, 14.83 kg ha-1, 152.45 kg ha-1, respectively. The lowest loss of NO3- however, observed under C. fulvus (40.5 kg ha-1) and that of P (6.05 kg ha-1 ) and K (26.2 kg ha-1 ) loss was noted under C. ciliaris. The highest loss of NO3- however, observed among grasses C. setigerus(46.32 kgha-1), and P from H. contortus(4.80 kgha-1) and K from P. maximum (50.99kgha-1).The load required to remove the root system of each grass vertically from the soil was used as a measure of soil binding capacity. We have found maximum average load required TSH(179.75 kg), H.contortus(166.3 kg) and minimum uprooted force C. fulvus(85.33kg).We found highest "soil binding strength index" for H. contortus(5.32) followed by TSH (4.11), P. Maximum (4.09) and lowest in C. ciliaris(3.44).The grass, which is having maximum value of Cr will have maximum soil binding capacity. The additional shear strength imposed by the grass roots was observed maximum for H. contortus (365.0 kPa) followed by TSH (298.5 kPa) and minimum was observed for C. ciliaris(139.3 kPa). Root systems lead to an increase in soil strength through an increase in cohesion brought about by their binding action in the fiber/soil composite. From this study, it has proven to be that grasses are effective for erosion control, providing a complete ground cover and grass roots have a mechanical effect on increasing soil strength.
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ASSESSMENT OF SOIL AND WATER CONSERVATION POTENTIAL OF DIFFERENT FORAGE GRASSES UNDER SEMI-ARID CONDITION
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