Due to increasing water and growing demand for food a more efficient water use system is needed for agriculture. This is more evidence for rice production with a higher water use for economical production. A large cultivar×water regime interaction exists for grain yield in rice. Therefore, information is required to adopt new rice cultivars with high yield potential under water-saving condition...

Anthropogenic climate change is expected to increase global temperatures and potentially increase soil carbon (C) mineralization, which could lead to a positive feedback between global warming and soil respiration. However the magnitude and spatial variability of belowground responses to warming are not yet fully understood. Some of the variability may depend on the native temperature regimes o...

some. Stermitz et al. (1999) found SSURGO data to be of little value in explaining yield variations. In more Managing soil variability is an integral aspect of precision agriculgeneral terms, the National Research Council (1997) ture (PA). Existing soil databases, however, are found to match few of the requirements for PA. The nature of these requirements and concluded that “current soil survey...

Seeds of many species do not germinate immediately after dispersal, but instead may remain indefinitely in a dormant but viable state. Although it is well established that seeds often exhibit diversified patterns of dormancy and germination, the causes and consequences of this variation remain poorly understood. In this study, we investigate the extent to which seed genotypes of the desert must...

A major challenge in rice (Oryza sativa L.) production is to enhance water use efficiency (WUE) and maintain or even increase grain yield. WUE, if defined as the biomass accumulation over water consumed, may be fairly constant for a given species in given climate. WUE can be enhanced by less irrigation. However, such enhancement is largely a trade-off against lower biomass production. If WUE is...

The percentage of soil pore space filled with water (percent waterfilled pores, % WFP), as determined by water content and total porosity, appears to be closely related to soil microbial activity under different tillage regimes. Soil incubated in the laboratory at 60% WFP supported maximum aerobic microbial activity as determined by CO2 production and O2 uptake. In the field, % WFP of surface n...

Alternate wettting and drying (AWD) systems save water compared with continuoussubmergence (CS) irrigation. However, the reported effect on yield varies widely and detailedcharacterizations of the hydrological conditions of AWD experiments are often lacking so thatgeneralizations are difficult to make. We compared the effects of AWD and CS on crop andwater productivity in rice in the field expe...

Corn (Zea mays L.) stover is a primary biofuel feedstock and its expanded use could help reduce reliance on fossil fuels and net CO2 emissions. Excessive stover removal may, however, negatively impact near-surface soil properties within a short period after removal. We assessed changes in soil crust strength, bulk density (rb), and water content over a 1-yr period following a systematic removal...