Determination of potential management zones from soil electrical conductivity, yield and crop data.

One approach to apply precision agriculture to optimize crop production and environmental quality is identifying management zones. In this paper, the variables of soil electrical conductivity (EC) data, cotton yield data and normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) data in an about 15 ha field in a coastal saline land were selected as data resources, and their spatial variabilities were firstly analyzed and spatial distribution maps constructed with geostatistics technique. Then fuzzy c-means clustering algorithm was used to define management zones, fuzzy performance index (FPI) and normalized classification entropy (NCE) were used to determine the optimal cluster numbers. Finally one-way variance analysis was performed on 224 georeferenced soil and yield sampling points to assess how well the defined management zones reflected the soil properties and productivity level. The results reveal that the optimal number of management zones for the present study area was 3 and the defined management zones provided a better description of soil properties and yield variation. Statistical analyses indicate significant differences between the chemical properties of soil samples and crop yield in each management zone, and management zone 3 presented the highest nutrient level and potential crop productivity, whereas management zone 1 the lowest. Based on these findings, we conclude that fuzzy c-means clustering approach can be used to delineate management zones by using the given three variables in the coastal saline soils, and the defined management zones form an objective basis for targeting soil samples for nutrient analysis and development of site-specific application strategies.

Quantification of the effects of management factors on maize (Zea mays L.) and cotton (Gossypium hirsutum L.) residues decomposition rate.

Efforts to quantify management effects on decomposition rate of added substrates to the soil is important especially where such information is to be used for prediction in mathematical or simulation models. Using data from a short-term (60 days) greenhouse simulation study, a procedure for quantifying effects of management on SOM and substrate decomposition is presented. Using microbial growth rate u(q), microbial efficiency in substrate utilization e(q), specific decomposition rates for added plant residues to two contrasting soils, red earth (Ferrasol) and black earth (Acrisol) were estimated. The treatments included straw addition + buried, (T1); straw addition + mineral N (T2); and straw addition + tillage, (T3). Sampling was done every 15 days. Straw decomposition rate was affected by external mineral N sources (Urea 46% N). Addition of an external N source significantly increased decomposition rates. The study could not, however, fully account for the effect of tillage on residues because of the limited effect of the tillage method due to the artificial barrier to mechanical interference supplied by the mesh bags. It is concluded that using few decomposer parameters, decomposition rates and consequently SOM trends in a soil system can be monitored and quantification of the influence of perturbations on decomposition rate of added substrates possible.

[Application of ecosystem service value in land use change research: Bottlenecks and prospects].

In recent years, the application of ecosystem service value in land use change research is a hot topic in many famous international journals. However, policy makers are seldom taking into account the achievements of the related studies in practice. This paper summarized the three main bottlenecks in applying ecosystem service value in land management practices, i. e., the difficulty in measuring the service values, the complexity of driving factors, and the bias of evaluation criteria. Some solutions on the bottlenecks were provided, and the future research directions in China were prospected. It was suggested that in the studies of land use change based on ecosystem service value, it would be more appropriate to adopt comparative analysis method in small scale case studies, especially focusing on the natural ecological resources and the excessive loss of their values.

[Ecological design of ditches in agricultural land consolidation: a review].

Agricultural land consolidation is a strong disturbance to farmland ecosystem. In traditional agricultural land consolidation, the main technical and economic indices for the design of ditches include the convenience for production and transportation, the allocation of water resources, and the improvement of water utilization, but short of ecological consideration, which has already affected the spread of agricultural species, caused the degradation of bio-habitat, and given obvious negative effects on the bio-competition mechanism, buffering and compensation capacity, and insect pests-resistance of farmland ecosystem. This paper summarized the functions of ecological ditches, and introduced the recent progress on the formations and construction designs of ecological ditches, tests of ecological engineering methods, and technologies and methods of choosing correct ecological materials. It was suggested that the future research should focus on the different functional requirements and specifications for different roads and ditches, and the characteristics and habitats of all the organisms and animals should be considered by the designers and constructors. Moreover, a comprehensive design which meets the ecological demands for the ditches' formations, structures, and regulatory sizes should be taken into account to solve the most of the problems listed above.

[Spatiotemporal changes of wetlands in Hangzhou Bay Industrial Belt].

By using RS and GIS techniques, the spatiotemporal changes of wetlands in Hangzhou Bay Industrial Belt, one of the most developed zones in Zhejiang Province, from 1990 to 2005 were studied. There was a frequent conversion between the wetlands and other land use types and between the wetlands themselves, mainly manifested in the conversion between wetland and farmland, and from wetland to construction land and from tidal flat to aquiculture area. The comparative advantage of other land use types and the policy of cultivated land's requisition-compensation balance decided the inherent mechanisms of these spatiotemporal changes. Driven by the aquaculture's comparative advantage to traditional agriculture, large areas of inland farmland and of the tidal flat along the coast of Hangzhou Bay were reclaimed into aquiculture area, and the rapid expansion of construction land, limited land resources, and the implement of cultivated land's requisition-compensation balance policy induced the wetlands being occupied.