Effect of protective forest strip on the crop productivity in the Central Fore-Caucasus

Alexander N. Esaulko, Ludmila V. Trubacheva, Olga I. Vlasova, Irina A. Volters and Vera M. Perederieva.

Stavropol State Agrarian University 12, Zootehnichesky Pereulok, Stavropol 355017, Russia

DOI : http://dx.doi.org/10.13005/bbra/2015

ABSTRACT: At present all the necessary information has been accumulated on current topic, and our findings confirm once again the opinions of many scientists about the positive effect of protective forest strips on the wind-resistance, snow accumulation, humidity dynamics, and infestation of crops. The article presents research data concerning the ameliorative role of protective forest strips on the crops productivity evidence from winter wheat. Remoteness from a protective forest strip substantially affected the accumulation of productive moisture by the time of winter wheat sowing. In this regard, we determined the content of productive moisture in the soil for all experimental plots. Besides, soil moisture formation strongly depended on snow accumulation. Thus, moving away from the protective forest strip resulted in decrease of the snow cover depth. At a distance of 10–20H from the protective forest strip, the snow cover depth was 25–30 cm decreasing to 5–10 cm with further increase in the distance. The overall influencing distance of protective forest strips varies from 0 to 30Н. The same trend was maintained with regard to the formation of moisture content. Impact on weediness was manifested in such a way that the smallest amount of weeds was observed at a distance of 0-10H. When moving away from the protective forest strip, the amount of weeds grew, as well as species composition, and further (30-40H) the amount of weeds per square meter decreased. The maximum wheat yield (3.86 t/ha) was obtained at a distance of 10-20H from the protective forest strip.

KEYWORDS: protective forest strip; consumptive water use; humidity conditions; infestation; wind erosion

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