STRUCTURAL-AGGREGATE COMPOSITION AND WATER STABILITY OF SOIL UNDER THE INFLUENCE OF PERENNIAL LEGUMES GRASSES
In conditions of todays agriculture, we notice an intensive influence of heavy agricultural machinery on soil. Along with the absence of vegetation on a ploughed field in post-harvest and fallow period, as well as the effects of biological processes with an annual deficit of fresh organic matter leads to mechanical destruction of aggregates, to structurelessness of arable soils. Today, therefore, the issue of maintaining, improving and restoring the structure is quite relevant. The objective of our research was to study the influence of legumes in their process of growth and development on soil structure and its water stability. Structural-aggregate composition of the soil and its water stability were determined by N.I. Savvinovs technique (dry and wet sieving). This article contains the results of the research of the Agriculture Department of the Voronezh SAA on cultivation of legumes in the link of the crop sunflower - fallow - winter wheat, used both as a binary component of sunflower and wheat and as fallow cultures. The biologisation method achieved the improvement of soil structure (structure factor increased by 0.17-0.74 units) and the increase in its water stability (by 1.98-5.71 abs.%). As a result of the research, conclusions were drawn about the favorable impact of perennial legumes grasses on the formation of agronomically valuable soil layer 0-30 cm.