Contribuição para o estudo da influência da profundidade de trabalho do arado na produção agrícola

Abstract

No matter what crop is concerned, plowing the soil is the main agricultural practice. Its importance is well known since many centuries ago: suffices to say that the Romans before Christ already had a theory on plowing the land. Thus, the plow, the oldest agricultural implement, has always attracted the attention of farmers, engineers and people engaged on agricultural mechanics. For this reason, its evolution was remarkable. The study of the plow, under both an agricultural and an econcmic point of view, is of great interest to agricultural mechanica, since on such a kind of research is based the best method of application of the plow. The present paper deals with an experiment carried out to obtain data on the use and effect of plowing as related to different depths of doing it. The soil worked out presented the following characteristics: total sand - 75.7%, clay - 13.5%, silt - 10.8%; hence, it is a sandy soil. Plowing was made at the following depths: 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, and 30 cm. in the first two years; in the third year, another depth was included, that is, 40 cm., which corresponds to an under-plowing. The field trial was conducted with four replicates throughout, plots 50 X 20 m. being used. Corn was planted to find out the effects of the depth of plowing on such a crop. The following conclusions can be drawn: 1. on the experimental conditions, yield was directly proportional to the depth of plowing; in other words, the deeper the plow works, the best is the yield therein obtained; 2. it is therefore suggersted that on soils similar to this experiment's it is advisable to plow deeper than usual; a working depth of 252cm. is recommended.