Reclamation of Sodic-Saline Soils. Barley Crop Response

• Main Authors: Giovanni Lacolla, Giovanna Cucci
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: PAGEPress Publications 2008-12-01
• Series: Italian Journal of Agronomy
• Online Access: https://www.agronomy.it/index.php/agro/article/view/253

The research was aimed at assessing the salinity and sodicity effects of two soil types submitted to correction on barley crop. The two soils, contained in cylindrical pots (0.40 m in size and 0.60 m h) supplied with a bottom valve for the collection of drainage water and located under shed to prevent the leaching action of rainfall, were clay-textured and saline and sodic-saline at barley seeding, as they had been cultivated for 4 consecutive years with different herbaceous species irrigated with 9 types of brackish water. In 2002-2003 the 2 salinized and sodium-affected soils (ECe and ESP ranging respectively from 5.84-20.27 dSm-1 to 2.83-11.19%), submitted to correction, were cultivated with barley cv Micuccio, and irrigated with fresh water (ECw = 0.5 dS m-1 and SAR = 0.45) whenever 30% of the maximum soil available moisture was lost by evapotranspiration. Barley was shown to be a salt-tolerant species and did not experience any salt stress when grown in soils with an initial ECe up to 11 dS m-1. When it was grown in more saline soils (initial ECe of about 20 dS m-1), despite the correction, it showed a reduction in shoot biomass and kernel yield by 26% and 36% respectively, as compared to less saline soils.