Higher Grain Yields with Wider Row Spacing Under No-till: Is It Possible?.

The challenge is too increase food production to meet the needs of an increasing world population under a scenario of decreasing arable land area and reduced water availability for irrigation. This comes on top of climate change scenarios which will lead to greater weather fluctuations and increased drought in some of the important grain producing areas of the world. Current research has demonstrated that water use efficiency of wheat, canola, field pea, lentil and chickpea can be increased simply by seeding into tall stubble due to an altered micro-climate inside the stubble. This has implications with respect to row spacing and nitrogen fertilizer management.  Studies were conducted to measure the effects of row spacing (25, 30, 35 and 40 cm) and rates of side-banded urea nitrogen fertilizer (20, 40, 60, 80 and 120 kg N/ha) on the production of oat under no-till conditions. The results, after three years, demonstrated that wider row spacing greater than 30 cm and side banded nitrogen are feasible. This opens up the opportunity of exploiting more fully the benefits of tall stubble by allowing greater ease of seeding between stubble rows.