Abstract:

North China Plain is characterized by high water consumption of winter wheat and summer maize system, considered the local crops ecological adaptation and the safety requirements of grain and cotton production, we selected 3 different crop rotations to do this long-term experiment from 2003 to 2010. These plant patterns are wheat /maize - Spring Sweetpotato - Spring Cotton - Spring Sweetpotato (G-C-S), Ryegrass / Spring Cotton - Peanut - wheat/maize (R/C-P-G) and wheat/maize- Peanut(G-P). This study was to analyze the feasibility of the three rotation patterns instead of winter wheat and summer maize plantation. This research was focused on studying the water consumption characteristics of rotation patterns. Through the determination of soil moisture in a rotation cycle (2006-2009), we analyzed the changes in soil water storage, water consumption, soil volumetric water content at all levels and the balance of soil water storage of different patterns. The results showed that compared with wheat and maize system, soil water storage and use of soil moisture at different levels of three rotation patterns showed more significant stubble effect. These three alternative rotations were better to achieve the annual complementary use of water. The water consumption of wheat/maize system was about 18% more than the patterns of G-C-S and G-P. The increase of water storage of G-C-S and G-P could reach to 20 mm a year which had no significant difference with wheat and maize system, but the invalid evaporation during the 4 years of the G-C-S and G-P was significantly higher than wheat and maize system. The water consumption of G-C-P was 5.4% less than the pattern of wheat/maize, the increase of water storage of G-C-P was about 18 mm which was significantly less than wheat/maize system. There was no significant difference between G-C-P and wheat/maize plantation in the invalid evaporation of moisture. The water-saving effect of G-C-P was better than wheat/maize system, but there was no significant difference between them. Of these three alternative patterns G-C-S and G-P plantation had the better effects to replace wheat/maize plantation. From the perspective of food security, G-P crop rotation was the best.