Soil conservation cultivation practices to improve soil profile structure

Ľubomír Marhavý & Ivana Šindelková

In a situation where even the plow is no longer a key tool for the farmer, but the seed drill decides on the possibility of establishing a stand and its construction is the highest time to think. If there has been no interest so far, then from now on it is necessary to think about the change of cultivation technologies. The main problem of this time is how to prepare too wet soil to be sown in it. Even strict adherence to agrotechnical deadlines is undergoing a significant reassessment. The priority has become to have sown at least, the deadline is no longer so important. But this reflection should have occurred at least a decade ago. The impossibility of preparing the soil before sowing mechanically raises the question of what other way? There is only one suitable way and that is the biological way. As nature invented millions of years ago. Intercrop mixtures or cover crops solve pre-sowing soil preparation efficiently and easily through symbiosis of the root system and soil microbiota. However, the most significant benefit is their ability to improve and stabilize the soil structure and thus the infiltration of rainwater. The world trend, especially with regard to the current situation in Slovakia and the Czech Republic, is the transition to direct sowing with the use of the already mentioned intermediate crops, cover crops and soil biostimulation. The benefits are many, the benefits are different, the need is common. The world trend, not only from the point of view of economic efficiency of cultivation, soil revitalization, carbon sequestration, water management in the soil profile, but especially about the simple possibility of quality sowing is represented by direct sowing. And the aim of this lecture is to show that it works.