engleski

Innovated retro: Cover cropping and horse traction to combat soil compaction and improve soil fertility

Soil compaction becomes an increasingly important issue in modern agriculture of industrialized economies. It adversely affects many components of soil fertility, like the capacity to store water for drought periods, to provide a proper drainage and aeration of roots, to ensure the richness of soil biota, thus creating a favorable environment for plant growth. Many researches have indicated that the main causes for soil compaction are the use of heavy machinery and loss of soil organic matter. On the other hand cover cropping has been recognized for decades to recover many components of soil fertility, especially the richness of soil biota, the soil’s penetration resistance, the capacity to store water and nutrients, and the resistance to compaction induced by agricultural machinery. However, the restoration of soil fertility traits through cover cropping alone may not be completely satisfactory and fast enough. Therefore research on the effect of animal traction on soil fertility traits in agriculture could be rewarding. The support for this idea comes from the recent findings that horse traction in agriculture prevents soil compaction magnitudes found in modern mechanized farming. Since there are no available data on the combined effects of horse traction and cover-copping to the soil fertility and compaction issues, the authors consider that research in field trials on this subject is needed. The prospective field trials would provide not only data about the aspects mentioned above, but also about daily work outcomes, needs for human labor and economics of this kind of reviewed traditional way of agriculture. The obtained data could serve for further projections of impacts to the people’s welfare, national and regional economy, farming sustainability and environment protection.

soil compaction ; soil fertility ; farming sustainability

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