Agron. Sustain. Dev. (2015) 35:701–711 DOI 10.1007/s13593-014-0257-y

Falong Hu & Qiang Chai & Aizhong Yu & Wen Yin & Hongyan Cui & Yantai Gan

F. Hu :Q. Chai(*):A. Yu:W. Yin :H. Cui:Y. Gan Gansu Provincial Key Laboratory of Aridland Crop Science, Lanzhou 730070, China e-mail: Chaiq@gsau.edu.cn

F. Hu :Q. Chai:A. Yu:W. Yin :H. Cui College of Agronomy, Gansu Agricultural University, Lanzhou 730070, China

Y. Gan Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, Semiarid Prairie Agricultural Research Centre, Swift Current, SK S9H 3X2, Canada

Accepted: 26 September 2014/Published online: 29 October 2014 # INRA and Springer-Verlag France 2014 Abstract Intercropping is used to increase grain production in many areas of the world. However, this increasing crop yield costs large amounts of water used by intercropped plants. In addition, intercropping usually requires higher inputs that induce greenhouse gas emissions. Actually, it is unknown whether intercropping can be effective in waterlimited arid areas. Here, we measured crop yield, water consumption, soil respiration, and carbon emissions of wheat– maize intercropping under different tillage and crop residue management options. A field experiment was conducted at Wuwei in northwest China in 2011 and 2012. Our results show that wheat–maize intercropping increased grain yield by61%in2011and63%in2012comparedwiththeaverage yield of monoculture crops. The intercropping under reduced tillage with stubble mulching yielded 15.9 t ha−1 in 2011 and 15.5t ha−1 in2012, anincreaseof7.8 % in2011 and 8.1% in 2012, compared to conventional tillage. Wheat–maize intercropping had carbon emission of 2,400 kg C ha−1 during the growing season, about 7 % less than monoculture maize, of 2,580 kg C ha−1. Reduced tillage decreased C emission overconventionaltillageby6.7%fortheintercropping,5.9% for monoculture maize, and 7.1 % for monoculture wheat. Compared to monoculture maize, wheat–maize intercropping used more water but emitted 3.4 kg C per hectare per millimeter ofwater used,whichwas 23%lowerthanmonoculture maize. Overall, our findings show that maize–wheat intercropping with reduced tillage coupled with stubble mulching can be used to increase grain production while effectively lower carbon emissions in arid areas.

Keywords Intercropping .Reducedtillage .Stubble retention .Soilrespiration .Carbonemission