The potential of corn-soybean intercropping to improve the soil health status and biomass production in cool climate boreal ecosystems.

ABSTRACT: Intercropping (IC) is a promising approach used to improve soil health and sustainable crop production. However, it is unknown whether IC improve the soil health status and biomass productivity of crops cultivated in podzols under cool climate in boreal ecosystems. Two silage corn and three forage soybean genotypes were cultivated either as inter or monocrop (MC) treatments in a randomized complete block design. IC resulted in 28% increase in total forage production (FP). A reduction in rhizosphere soil pH (RS-pH) was observed in the IC treatments. Conversely, the rhizosphere soil acid phosphatase (RS-APase) activity was significantly higher (26-46%) in the IC treatments and occurred concomitant with a significant increase in available phosphorus (RS-P_available) (26-74%) in the

SUBMITTER: Zaeem M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6739473 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature