Effects of tillage and planting patterns on soil infiltration parameters and water flow of border irrigation

Abstract: It is important to understand infiltration characteristics of irrigation water in soils under different tillage and planting pattern conditions. In this study, we studied the effects of tillage and planting patterns on soil infiltration parameters and flow movement of border irrigation. A total of 4 treatments were designed. They were subsoiling and rotary tillage with planting mode of equal line spacing (15 cm) (I), same with I in tillage method but different in planting mode with line spacing of 12.5 cm+12.5 cm+15 cm (II), same with I except that subsoiling is not used (III) and same with III except that the planting mode is line spacing of 12.5 cm+12.5 cm+15 cm (IV). The treatment of I and II had the same tillage method but different planting pattern and the treatment of I and III had the same planting pattern but different tillage method. A total of 3 plots with different lengths (30 m, 35 m and 40 m) and same width (2 m) were prepared for each treatment. The calculated values of infiltration parameters were obtained by Kostiakov model. Meanwhile, WinSRFR4.1 software optimization method was used to obtain the simulated values of infiltration parameters. Then, the effect of infiltration parameters variability on water movement was analyzed. The results showed that: 1) the maximum relative errors of infiltration coefficient and infiltration index between the calculated value and the simulated value by the software were 1.24% and 1.57%, respectively. It indicated that it was feasible to simulate the soil infiltration parameters under different tillage and planting patterns by the software. 2) The tillage and planting method had effects on soil infiltration parameters. Compared to the planting pattern, the tillage had the much more influence on the infiltration parameters. 3) Coefficients of variation of infiltration coefficient were up to 0.34 and 0.22 at the wintering and jointing stage, respectively. In these 2 stages, the coefficients of variation of infiltration index reached 0.14 and 0.13, respectively. The infiltration parameters showed a time-dependent change trend. The infiltration coefficient under the subsoiling plus rotary tillage condition had the medium variability while the infiltration index of the rotary tillage had the weak variability. 4) Affected by the influence of variability of infiltration parameters, the irrigation water movement was also variable depending on the time. The variability of water movement during the second irrigation period was weaker than that during the first irrigation period. 5) Based on the variability of soil infiltration parameters, infiltration parameters in the 2 irrigation periods were determined in the different tillage and planting pattern. The result proposed in this study could better provide technical support for the design and management evaluation of border irrigation system.