ABSTRACT Grasses of the Brachiaria genus are widely used as cover crops in no-tillage areas of the Brazilian Cerrado. This study aimed to evaluate the ability of six Brachiaria cultivars to produce shoot and root biomass, and the potential of the root system to grow through a 0.01 m thick wax layer with 1.5 MPa penetration resistance. The plants were grown in PVC columns with a diameter of 0.1 m and a height of 0.7 m. The column was divided […]

It has been found that the results of the land use and management techniques adopted for soils derived from Caiuá sandstone in the Northwest of Paraná are not always satisfactory in terms of crop yields. In this region, sandstone occurs in two forms: the Caiuá and Paranavaí Formations, with differences in soil particle size. We hypothesized that the water retention and availability for agricultural production is lower in the Caiuá soils, due to the higher proportion of coarse sand than […]

Soil physical quality in continuous and short-duration rotational cattle grazing systems was evaluated using the Least Limiting Water Range (LLWR) approach. Soil samples were collected on an experimental site at the Embrapa – Beef Cattle Research Center (Campo Grande, MS, Brazil). The studied soil was a Typic Acrudox. Four sampling sites were selected: two under a short-duration continuous grazing system and two under intensive short-duration rotational grazing system. Thirty soil cores were collected in each site under the continuous grazing […]