The effect of autumn ridging and inter-row subsoiling on potato tuber yield and quality

Summary

Autumn ridging is a modified version of the ridge tillage system. Instead of setting up ridges during the growing season, they are established in autumn and left for the winter. Previous studies have documented positive effects of autumn ridging on potato yield and we hypothesize that applying subsoiling could enhance these effects. To determine the effect of autumn ridging and inter-row subsoiling on potato yield and quality a field experiment was conducted on sandy soil from 2001-2003. Autumn ridging showed comparable yields to ploughing and significantly reduced the incidence of black scurf from 2.5% to 2.2%. Inter-row subsoiling in the growing season significantly increased marketable potato tuber yield from 84.4 hkg/ha to 96.3 hkg/ha and reduced the percentage of malformed potatoes from 9.3% to 7.5%, irrespective of tillage treatment and irrigation level. There was no significant interaction between autumn ridging and subsoiling. The beneficial effect of subsoiling on marketable yield was driven by a 48.5% increase in the dry year 2001. Subsoiling reduced the incidence of common scab from 7.8% to 6.9% when irrigation was reduced. It is concluded that at least three factors may modify the effects of subsoiling: Soil water status in the growing season, precipitation immediately before and after the subsoiling operation, and crop growth stage at the time of subsoiling.