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Acta Prataculturae Sinica ›› 2012, Vol. 21 ›› Issue (5): 204-212.

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Effect of fertilization on biomass of alfalfa in returned farmland in semiarid loess hilly area

CAI Guo-jun1,2,ZHANG Ren-dou1,CHAI Chun-shan2   

  1. 1.College of Resource and Environment, Gansu Agricultural University, Lanzhou 730070, China;
    2.Gansu Academy of Forestry, Lanzhou 730020, China
  • Received:2012-06-11 Online:2012-05-25 Published:2012-10-20

Abstract: For increasing the aboveground biomass of alfalfa (Medicago sativa) in returned farmland and prolonging its degradation time, the mixed fertilization experiment of nitrogen and phosphate fertilizer was conducted two times in 2007-2008, on alfalfa grassland that has been planted for five years in Longtan catchment, Anding district, Dingxi city. The result showed that nitrogen fertilizer has no obvious effect on increasing the growth conditions and biomass of alfalfa. However, phosphate fertilizer has significant influence on promoting the alfalfa’s growth and increasing biomass. And the mean biomass of fertilized alfalfa in 2007 and 2008 was 1.62 and 1.15 times the biomass of control alfalfa respectively. The highest biomass of alfalfa was appeared when phosphate fertilizer rate was highest of 12 kg/667 m2. The mean fresh biomass of alfalfa can achieve 18 240 kg/ha on seventh year. The growth conditions and biomass of alfalfa on sunny-slopes was better than that on shady-slopes,and its mean fresh and dry biomass were 1.49 and 1.43 times the biomass of shady-slopes respectively. In the semiarid loess area with 400 mm annual precipitation, the biomass of alfalfa harvest was mainly produced by the 1st harvest and it accounted for about 75% of annual biomass, whereas the biomass of 2nd harvest was small and accounted for about 25%. So twice per year for alfalfa harvest is optimized in this area.

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