Impact Of Some Agronomic Practices On Soil Physical And Hydraulic Properties: An Overview Of Common Cases Study In Semi-Arid Environments

The development and adoption of sustainable agronomic practices able to preserve and enhance the physical properties of soils and improve agroecosystem functions, with the aim of safeguarding of irrigation and meteoric water, is a challenge for both scientists and farmers. In this investigation a selection of some agronomic practices, common for the Mediterranean agro-environments, including conventional tillage and no-tillage at different soil depth, incorporation of wheat straw into the soil, as well as soil amendments with biochar, were considered. Selected experimental evaporation experiments, obtained under controlled laboratory conditions, were used to detect and summarize the main effect induced on water retention and soil permeability. The use of capacitive indicators, for which reference values of literature are available, e.g., relative field capacity (RFC), allowed to discriminate the effects induced by agronomic treatments, both in accordance with expectations and the results obtained in previous experimental investigations. Results of RFC have clearly highlighted the agronomic treatments that are most capable of modifying the water/air balance of the soil. This study represents an experimental contribution with a view to spreading knowledge on the sustainability of agronomic practices. It further confirms that the assessment of the sustainability of agronomic practices needs specific assessments repeated in space and time, considering long-term experiments.