The microenvironment near the seed is directly affected by the type of mechanism of furrow opening and the soil compacting element. This study was therefore carried out to evaluate the soil density close to the seed in a no-till system using computerized tomography. The experiment was set up in a split-plot design in which the plots consisted of three soil water contents (0.22; 0.28; and 0.34 kg kg-1), and the subplots of two mechanisms for furrow opening (stub runner and double disk-type). The sub-subplots consisted of two compacting element types (rubber and plain) in a maize crop. The experiment was in a randomized block design with three replications. Some undisturbed soil samples corresponding to a planting spot in the planting row were removed to establish tomographies with millimetrical resolution for the determination of soil density. The maximum, minimum and average soil densities were determined at the point where the seed had been placed in the undisturbed block. The results showed that the treatments had no significant influence on the values of emergence speed index, or on the minimum density measured by the tomograph. The double-disk mechanism led to higher values of densities measured by tomography, both mean and maximum, as well as lower emergence. The use of a rubber compacting element resulted in lower seed pressure a greater contact area with the soil. Computerized tomography appeared to be an adequate and efficient method to determine soil density in the seed area.
computerized tomography; no-till planting; furrowers; compaction; maize cultivation; germination
