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Introduction. To represent our national goods at the Western market it is necessary to ensure, first of all, the competitiveness of local products through complex mechanization of technological processes, labour costs reduction, increasing yields and quality of received products. The aim of the research is to provide the comparative analysis of technology and machines for potato harvesting, to determine the main factors that influence the agricultural technical indicators of harvesting equipment, to develop technological process patterns and to examine the strategies for improving the potato root-and-harvest machines. Methods and methodology. The research was carried out on the basis of technological and constructional analysis of technology and machines for potato harvesting. The methods of comparison and mathematical modelling of technological processes were used in the study. The research studies of Ukrainian and foreign scientists on technology and machines for potato harvesting were used as information base of our paper. Results. A comparative analysis of technology and machines for potato harvesting made it possible to determine the main factors that influence the agricultural performance of harvesting machinery and to develop the technological process for a digger, a double-loader digger and a harvester (harvesting machines). A theoretical model of the technological processes of harvesting machines includes both uncontrolled and controlled factors that influence the choice of a potato harvesting technology of a digger, a double-loader digger and a harvester. Nevertheless, the first factors are connected, primarily, with the conditions of potato growth and its biological properties, and the second factors deal with the organizational and technical measures, including the improvement of the working bodies of machines (cutting, dirt digging through, top separation, longitudinal hump with cut roller and other constructive and kinematic parameters), quality of received products, length and terms of potato storage, available farming human resources, free vehicle in the period of harvesting, farm potato storage, farm equipment for potato cleaning and sorting.

A study was carried out at CSIR-CIMAP, RC. Hyderabad (India) to study the impact of coppicing time on the oil percent and its chemical composition of different cultivars of lemongrass using a randomized block design. The freshly harvested herb was used for the hydro-distillation for essential oil, and subsequent chemical analysis. The chemical components identification of the essential oil was performed by GC–MS. In the results coppicing time influenced significant changes in the essential oil content, essential oil yield, and its chemical composition especially, total citral, and geraniol content. The four top rankers varieties/cultivars of lemongrass for the essential oil yield were CIM-Shikhar > Krishna > CKP-25 > CIMAP-Suwarna; for the essential oil content CIM–Shikhar > Krishna > CIMAP-Suwarna > Praman; for total citral content Nima > CIM–Shikhar > Krishna > Pragati, and for the total geraniol content Himrosa > CN-5 > Tawirosa > Kalam, respectively. Therefore, we can recommend these varieties/cultivars for commercial cultivation in large areas under the semi-arid region of south India.

Urban expansions into natural habitats have forced many carnivores to adapt to the modified areas; however, our understanding of their ecology in such areas is limited. The Indian fox (Vulpes bengalensis) is a small carnivore species that can adapt and exploit urban areas due to its generalist nature, but there is a paucity of data on Indian foxes in these human-modified areas. To understand the resource requirement of Indian foxes in urban habitats, we conducted a diet analysis by examining 119 scats of Indian foxes in a peri-urban habitat of Baripada town, Odisha, eastern India. To determine the diet composition of Indian foxes, we analyzed scat contents by their frequency occurrence (%FO), the relative frequency of occurrence (%RF) and mean percent volume (%Vm). Indian foxes consumed a wide range of food categories, including arthropods, rodents, reptiles, birds, plant parts and anthropogenic resources. In %Vm, rodents showed the highest volume, followed by polythene, Spondias pinnata fruit and Coleoptera. We found anthropogenic foods in considerable quantities, including polythene and paper. The diet of Indian foxes indicates that the species has opportunistic and generalist feeding habits consisting primarily of easily accessible foods. Furthermore, management efforts should focus on the proper management of waste and control of anthropogenic food sources in urban habitats.

Plants sustain several ecosystem functions thereby playing a crucial role in conservation management. Lantana camara an invasive weed has become the common part of a bushes. The mutualistic relationship between this weed plant and butterflies are well known. Butterflies depend on Lantana camara for food, oviposition site, larval development etc. In this context we are highlighting the role of this invasive weed for butterfly conservation and maintaining total butterfly abundance. In this study the species richness highest for the site where the bushes were dominated by Lantana camara and lowest for the site where LCA abundance was low. The butterfly abundance and LCA abundance maintain a strong positive relationship and LCA abundance, species richness and and butterfly abundance are strongly correlated and dominance is negatively correlated with other three variables. So we can use the Lantana camara as a model organism for conservation and maintaining the butterfly abundance in Purulia, West Bengal, India.

Roselle (Hibiscus sabdariffa L.) is recognized as a valuable food crop due to its nutraceutical potential, rich pigment content, and medicinal properties. However, there is limited information on planting dates and suitable genotypes for roselle cultivation in arid and semi-arid regions. The objective of this field study was to investigate the influence of five planting dates (March, April, May, June, and July) on morphological and phytochemical characteristics of different roselle genotypes. Among genotypes, eight (Jiroft, Dalgan, Bampoor, Iranshahr, Nikshahr, Roodbar, Saravan, and Qaleganj) were Iranian landraces, and HA and HS-24 were originated from Ghana and Bangladesh, respectively. Planting date significantly influenced the number of branches, bolls and seeds per plant, sepal fresh weight, calyx and biomass yields, and harvest index in tested roselle landraces. The greatest morphological growth, fresh sepal weight (50.6 g plant−1) and calyx yield (1519 kg ha−1) were observed with the roselle planted in early May. Moreover, amounts of chlorophyll, flavonoids and antioxidant remained higher in roselle when planted between April–May. The number of branches/plant was found to be an important determinant of calyx yield (r = 0.707) in roselle. Dalgan resulted in the greatest growth and yields within a comparatively shorter period of time compared to other tested landraces. Both principal component analysis (PCA) and cluster analysis also indicated that Dalgan landrace possessed most suitable morphological and phytochemical traits among tested landraces, and therefore, it could be planted adopted for extensive cultivation settings in the arid and semi-arid regions.

Bacteria are considered as foremost bioremediating agents among microorganisms, encompassing simple biological mechanism to tolerate higher concentration of heavy metal and favoring conservative strategies to substitute the usage of chemicals. Relating this implication, the present study is designed to identify, screen and characterize bacteria from industrial site soil to tolerate multimetals. Almost 108 colonies were obtained at various concentrations (0.5–2.0 mM) of heavy metals (cadmium, nickel and lead) and were thrived in the reformed minimal media. Bacterial isolates that grown in the higher concentration of heavy metals (2.0 mM) were taken for further studies. Among ten bacterial colonies, one isolate was selected for each heavy metal and further screened for their multi metal tolerance. Isolate, C20 alone survived in heavy metal mixture fortified medium with high recovery rate and increased colony forming units. Molecular level characterization and phylogenetic tree analysis revealed that the isolate is identical to Bacillus thuringiensis. The study highlights that the multi metal tolerant B. thuringiensis could be used as an effective bioremediating agent to manage heavy metals particularly cadmium, nickel and lead in industrial area. Further, attributed to be a plant growth promoting rhizobacteria, this organism can promote dual stratagems as a bio remediating agent and fertility enhancer in agricultural field due to its dual functions.

Enormous biotic stresses, such as uncontrolled grazing, logging, use of plants for timber and fuelwood, deforestation for cultivation, and road constructions have drastically deteriorated forests in the Kashmir Himalaya. On the basis of the intensity of biotic stress, three differently forest sites, protected, unprotected and roadside forest, were studied. Random vegetation sampling was done to record herbaceous diversity in the Tangmarg Forest Division of Kashmir valley in 2019. Six diversity indices were negatively correlated with increasing levels of anthropogenic disturbance. The values further elucidated by the Renyi diversity profiles, indicated that the protected forest sites had significantly higher diversity as compared to the road side forest sites. Scaling based on an increased order of total number of species in the forest richness and diversity – on top were protected forest sites, followed by unprotected forest sites, while road side forest sites were on the lower end of this spectrum. The Principal component analysis (PCA) showed two distinct groups based on the composition and IVI of the plant species. The results of this study identify diverse biotic stresses and could help in framing the policies for forest management.

Clove basil (Ocimum gratissimum L.) is an aromatic, perennial herb belonging to the family Lamiaceae. The plant is indigenous to tropical areas especially India and West Africa. In Nigeria, it is found in the Savannah and coastal areas. The whole herbs of the plant contain essential oils and it is cultivated for various purposes. The plant is a rich source of eugenol in its essential oil. It is also used in the preparation of tea and infusions. It is also used in the treatment of fungal infections, fever, cold, and cough. Eugenol (4-allyl-2-methoxy phenol) is a phenolic compound from the class of phenylpropanoids. It is used in the food industry as a preservative, mainly due to its antioxidant property, and flavoring agent. The fresh herb × winter season/environment produced the highest essential oil 2.07 mL/plot with essential oil content 0.41% followed by fresh herb × summer season/environment (M1S2) = 1.68 mL. For the eugenol content, the autumn season/environment was found highly favorable = 74.52% (leaves = 69.024, stem = 74.531, and in inflorescence = 80.012) followed winter season/environment 72.30% (leaves = 71.841, stem 69.389, inflorescence 76.042, mean = 72.42%). These seasons are recommended for harvesting to obtain the optimum benefit for the quality essential oil yield.

The species Schleichera oleosa (Kusum), being rich in nutritional, medicinal and processing qualities can play a very important role in the livelihood security of the rural communities through enhanced household income, employment generation and environmental protection. People of many states of India are becoming increasingly aware about the potential importance of this species in terms of its ethnobotany and lac production in their livelihood security. Value addition of all the components especially seed oil for biodiesel production, lac production and processing of bark for exploiting their nutritional and medicinal properties is a long-term strategy. There is need of increasing the area and plantation of this valuable species and enhancing their processed products. Moreover, to domesticate this species on farmer's field, there is a need to develop good cultivars. Hence, there is an ample scope in developing propagation methods and suitable good cultivars through nursery management programme. Dissemination of improved production technologies, value addition and marketing strategies regarding Kusum trees and its products to the farmers/entrepreneurs/lac based industries is of utmost importance for promoting it as agribusiness.

Spirulina is a filamentous, multi-cellular and autotrophic cyanobacterium having distinct features of helical shape filaments (i.e. trichomes). An investigation is to isolate a marine, Spirulina subsalsa from Vellar estuary, South East Coast zone of India. The isolated strain sub-cultured in Zarrouk medium with optimum conditions for sustaining growth. Pure cultures were examined in a research microscope for morphometric studies through 16S rRNA sequencing and the sequence was submitted to NCBI-GENBANK, the accession number is MW037197 which displays the maximum similarity as 100% with a diverse sequence in databank i.e. LC 215280. The investigation is the first record for the existence of Spirulina subsalsa in Vellar Estuary, South East Coast, Tamil Nadu (India) as affirmed by a molecular nucleotide sequence.

Human activities have significantly accelerated emissions of each carbon dioxide and biologically reactive nitrogen into the atmosphere. As nitrogen availability frequently limits forest productivity, it has long been anticipated that anthropogenic nitrogen deposition ought to stimulate carbon sequestration in forests. The present study aimed to understand the effects of nitrogen addition on the growth of the Syzygium cumini in ambient (408 ppm) and elevated (450 ppm, 500 ppm, 550 ppm and 600 ppm) carbon dioxide conditions. The addition of nitrogen in the form of potassium nitrate in different levels (0, 3, 6, 12, & 24 g N m−2) was used in this study. The responses of the plant in terms of growth (shoot length, leaf length and leaf width) were examined. Multiple regression equation was used for the model fit to determine the carbon content. The carbon content was found to be higher in all ambient and elevated CO2 conditions at the nitrogen addition level of 24 g N m−2.

Given that cultivated land serves as a strategic resource to ensure national food security, blind emphasis on improvement of food production capacity can lead to soil overutilization and impair other soil functions. Therefore, we took Heilongjiang province as an example to conduct a multi-functional evaluation of soil at the provincial scale. A combination of soil, climate, topography, land use, and remote sensing data were used to evaluate the functions of primary productivity, provision and cycling of nutrients, provision of functional and intrinsic biodiversity, water purification and regulation, and carbon sequestration and regulation of cultivated land in 2018. We designed a soil function discriminant matrix, constructed the supply-demand ratio, and evaluated the current status of supply and demand of soil functions. Soil functions demonstrated a distribution pattern of high grade in the northeast and low grade in the southwest, mostly in second-level areas. The actual supply of primary productivity functions in 71.32% of the region cannot meet the current needs of the population. The dominant function of soil in 34.89% of the area is water purification and regulation, and most of the cultivated land belongs to the functional balance region. The results presented herein provide a theoretical basis for optimization of land patterns and improvement of cultivated land use management on a large scale, and is of great significance to the sustainable use of black soil resources and improvement of comprehensive benefits.

The study reported on in this paper investigated smallholder farmers’ access to extension services. The study sought to distinguish the varying degrees of access to services of smallholder farmers engaged in different production systems, that is, home gardening, field cropping, and livestock production. The study was conducted in Raymond Mhlaba Local Municipality in the Eastern Cape, specifically in two communities, namely Ngcabasa and Phathikhala villages. Research activities included a survey of 100 farmers as well as focus group discussions. Employing logistic regression analysis, the study aimed to understand what influences whether or not a smallholder farmer accesses extension. The study also used various types of comparative statistics (T-test) to assess the implications of access to extension support, for instance for production and farm income. The main findings of the study were that 68% of the farming households interviewed in Ngcabasa and 71% of those in Phathikhala had access to extension services. Farmers who had access to extension had more farm income in both enterprises compared to those who had no access to extension services. From the regression analysis, farmers who were more likely to receive extension support appeared to be those who were older, those with less education, and those farming with livestock.

The objective of the study was to establish the actors’ roles and functions in improved rice varieties innovation system in the Eastern Zone of Tanzania. The target population samples for the study comprised of household heads (n = 340) and other key identified actors (n = 99). The research design was a convergent parallel mixed method. Face-to-face interviews, focus group discussions and documentary review were used to collect the data. The findings indicate weak or inability of Agricultural Seed Agency, TANSEED International Ltd, Quality Declared Seed producers in seed multiplication and distribution and agro-dealers were not selling quality rice seeds, thereby resulting in low availability and high prices of the same. Also, the findings show weak participation of farmers, agro-dealers, traders and millers in the functions of guidance of the search and rice varieties development, and the limited number of market actors and weak credit mobilization for farmers to invest in IRVs. The study recommends for the Government of Tanzania to create enabling environment that enhances participation of all key actors in the processes of guidance of the search and rice varieties development; linking farmers with external markets; and enhancing the farmers’ access to credit facilities by working on the obstacles hampering farmers from accessing loans from financial institutions.

Many proponents of organic farming claim that it is a sustainable alternative to conventional agriculture due to its reliance on natural agro-inputs, such as manure based fertilizers and organic pesticides. However, in this analysis we argue that although particular organic farming practices clearly benefit ecosystems and human consumers, the social context in which some organic farms develop, limit the potential environmental benefits of organic agriculture. Specifically, we argue that certified organic farming’s increased reliance on agro-inputs, such as organic fertilizers and pesticides, reduces its ability to decrease global water pollution. We review recent research that demonstrates the environmental consequences of specific organic practices, as well as literature showing that global organic farming is increasing its reliance on agro-inputs, and contend that organic farming has its own metabolic rift with natural water systems similar to conventional agriculture. We use a fixed-effects panel regression model to explore how recent rises in certified organic farmland correlate to water pollution (measured as biochemical oxygen demand). Our findings indicate that increases in the proportion of organic farmland over time increases water pollution. We conclude that this may be a result of organic farms increasing their reliance on non-farm agro-inputs, such as fertilizers.

Pertanian berkelanjutan merupakan komponen penting dalam pencapaian Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Pengukuran keberlanjutan pertanian mutlak dilakukan untuk lebih memahami kondisi saat ini, mengidentifikasi tren, menetapkan target, memantau kemajuan, dan membandingkan kinerja antar wilayah. Penelitian tentang keberlanjutan pertanian di Indonesia lebih banyak dilakukan pada level usaha tani atau lokal. Indonesia belum memiliki indikator pertanian berkelanjutan yang menjadi tolok ukur penilaian pertanian berkelanjutan pada level regional/provinsi/nasional. Hal ini disebabkan karena begitu kompleksnya penilaian yang perlu dilakukan untuk mendapatkan hasil yang baik untuk penilaian pada level regional dan nasional. Indikator yang dapat diukur mengenai kelestarian lingkungan pertanian, dengan tujuan meminimalkan dampak lingkungan dari pertanian, merupakan alat penting untuk membantu menggerakkan dunia menuju masa depan pangan yang berkelanjutan. Indikator memungkinkan pembuat kebijakan, petani, bisnis, dan masyarakat sipil untuk lebih memahami kondisi saat ini, mengidentifikasi trend, menetapkan target, memantau kemajuan, dan membandingkan kinerja antar wilayah dan negara.

The objective of this work was to evaluate the agronomic characteristics of maize intercropping with Eucalyptus urophylla at agroforestry system in two triple row distance (alleys) at different sampling distances and positions in relation to the eucalyptus external row (transect), and three positions in relation to the cardinal points: east side, west side and middle. Eucalyptus (E. urophylla) seedlings were planted with spacing of 1.5 m between plants and 3.0 m between rows (triple rows) and two triple row distances: 16.5 and 37.1 m apart, with the spatial exposure of the rows towards north and south, ranging from 888 to 464 plants ha-1. It was observed that treatments differed in relation to the number of ears ha-1 and grain yield in both seasons. In addition, in relation to the final plant density ha-1, in the 2014/2015 season, the maize at 4.2 m distance from eucalyptus at 16.5 m triple row distance had lower number of ears ha-1 and grain yield, and maize at 8.2 m from eucalyptus at 37.1 m triple row distance had greater number of ears and grain yield. The cardinal positions (W/E) in relation to the eucalyptus did not influence the agronomic characteristics of the maize. Key words: Cropping systems, integrated systems, Zea mays.

Discovering new medicinal sources from food wastes is a beneficial and valuable way instead of their disposal. Fruits and vegetables waste can be an inexpensive and readily available source of bioactive compounds to be used in pharmaceutical industries. The aim of this study is to highlight the in vitro antioxidant, cytotoxic, and antimicrobial activities of the total extracts of banana peels (Musa acuminate), carrot peels (Daucus carota) and golden berry husk (Physalis peruviana) besides evaluating their in vivo acute and chronic toxicity profiles as well as their antimutagenic activity. Also, we investigated their phenolic and flavonoid contents spectrophotometrically and by HPLC. Results showed that D. carota peels revealed the highest antioxidant activity (29.903 mg TE/g) using DPPH free radical scavenging assay. Cytotoxic outcomes (SulphoRhodamine-B method) showed that the highest cytotoxic activity of M. acuminate peels (IC50: 20.7 μg/mL) was exerted on HEPG2 cell line, where D. carota peels (IC50: 18.8 μg/mL) showed the highest cytotoxic activity on PC-3 cell line. In addition, pH. peruviana husk (IC50: 10.5 ± 1.0 μg/mL) showed a potent cytotoxic activity on HCT-116 that is non-significant from the standard Doxorubicin (IC50: 11.5 ± 0.8 μg/mL). For the antimicrobial activity (agar diffusion assay), most of the total extracts revealed notable activities against all tested pathogens relative to the standards; ciprofloxacin and ketoconazole, specially Ph. peruviana husk that showed a potent inhibitory activity (inhibition zone diameter of 29 mm.) against C. albicans even more than the standard ketoconazole (inhibition zone diameter of 28 mm.). These promising biological activities are mainly related to the high content of flavonoids and phenolic compounds identified and quantified in their total extracts. Moreover, the three extracts proved their in vivo safety on the short and long terms as well as their possible antimutagenic effect on the genotoxicity of the drug cyclophosphamide (CP) in both bone marrow cells and spermatocyte cells.

The vetiver (Chrysopogon zizanioides (L.) Roberty) essential oil is obtained from its roots by hydro- or steam distillation. Its oil is used in cosmetics, perfumery and food industries, deodorants, soaps, cold drinks, and toilet articles. The present investigations' objective was to estimate essential oil yielding stability and the identification of environment-specific vetiver genotypes. Testing of genotypes under different years was done using additive main effect and multiplicative interaction model, genotype main effect with the genotype-by-environment interaction, and biplot statistical models for the stability of the essential oil yield. The results from both models showed that the best stable genotypes for the high essential oil were G 10, G 12, G 14, and G 15, respectively. The essential oil of the genotypes, G 10, G 14, and G 15 were rich for khusimol, Khusol, khusimone and khusian-2-ol in G 10; khusilal, α-cedrenal, α-cedrenol, khusol, khusitone in G 14, and khusilal, khusimol, α-cedrenal, α-cedrenol,khusol, khusitone in G 15 along with minor compounds having diverse aromatic characters. The two new compounds, namely, α-cedrenal and α-cedrenol were identified first in the Indian vetiver, while the line G 12 possessed khusilal and khusol as the major compounds. Therefore, these genotypes of vetiver are recommended for commercial exploitation.

The paper report the oral traditional knowledge of wild medicinal plants usage by the indigenous ethnic tribal community from the Peren district of Nagaland, India in the Indo-Burma Hotspot. The pioneer study was based on the semi-structured interview of locals (N = 240) in the 12 villages of the Peren District during 2014 ‐ 2018. In total, 179 ethnomedicinal plants from 140 genera and 72 families were documented and identified. The medicinal plants were used for the treatment of 96 different ailments grouped into 18 categories. The medicinal plants also showed high versatile nature with 85 species reported to treat five / eleven different ailments, respectively. The ethnobotanical information obtained from the field documentation will contribute in the development of potential drugs in the future from the diverse wild medicinal plants of the region and contribute towards the preservation of the oral tradition that is disappearing.

Helicoverpa armigera is one of the most devastating, cosmopolitan, polyphagous and multivoltine pests of agricultural crops. The growing side-effects of synthetic insecticides used to control agricultural pests, have amplified demand for the relatively safe and biodegradable compounds which offer benefits over synthetic chemical insecticides. Hence, the current study investigates the effects of Nerium oleander methanol leaf extracts on the physiological and reproductive fitness of H. armigera. Addition of the range of extract concentration; 0.5%–10.0%; in the larval diet induced an appreciable and dose-dependent effect on the developmental parameters of H. armigera. The extract, though resulted in moderate larval and pupal mortality, caused significant growth regulatory effects. A prolonged larval duration, formation of larval-pupal intermediates and significant reduction in the average larval weight gain by 26.5% - 63.4%; and pupal weight by 23.9% - 63.4% was recorded. The 74.6% to 54.9% reduction in the oviposition duration in the emerged adults, and diminished fecundity and egg hatch in the corresponding range of 0.78–0.63 and 0.89–0.62 demonstrated negative impact of the extract on the adult reproductive fitness. The adverse impact of N. oleander methanol leaf extracts on the growth and development of H. armigera leading to the reproductive disadvantage in adults can be beneficial in the field management; though its use can only be ascertained after identification of bioactive constituents and elucidating their mode of action.

On account of the uneven level of ecological and environmental protection in the countries along the Belt and Road, infrastructure construction and investment cooperation around natural resource-intensive industries such as steel, energy, and nonferrous metals can easily induce serious ecological problems. It is necessary and practical to provide enterprises with timely and effective ecological circumstantial information of Belt and Road and pilot the establishment of the Belt and Road infrastructure construction activities with appropriate ecological risk prevention and control mechanisms. In this study, we researched the ecological risk level distribution of the countries along the Belt and Road by using ESA global land cover data and ecological risk index mode of land use. Kuwait, one of the most representative countries along the Belt and Road, was selected to analyze its spatial distribution of ecological risk by using ordinary Kriging interpolation. The results show several aspects. There existed high-ranking ecological risks in the following countries: Saudi Arabia in the Middle East, Turkmenistan in the Central Asian, Mongolia in East Asia and Pakistan in South Asia and so on; the medium ecological risks appear in the following countries: Ukraine in Eastern Europe, India, Bangladesh in South Asian, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan in Central Asia the low ecological risk countries mainly include Russia, most Eastern European countries represented by Poland, and most Southeast Asian countries represented by Thailand. In the case, Kuwait's risk level is high in urban areas, medium in desert areas, and low along the Persian Gulf, showing a layered and striped distribution. Most areas in Kuwait are medium ecological risk zones with a relatively small area of high ecological risk and low ecological risk areas clustered in the eastern part of Kuwait. To effectively lower the ecological risk levels of countries along B&R, we suggest establishing B&R ecological risk prevention and control mechanisms while ecological conservation technologies are also worth noting.

This study conducted from January to June 2018, attempts to determine the density, habitat preferences and attitudes of people towards Gekko gecko and its impact on the conservation of this species in human-dominated landscapes in Sonitpur district, Assam. Eight villages at different distances from Nameri Tiger Reserve were chosen for the study. The line transects analyzed using DISTANCE software estimated a density of 7.99 individuals ha−1 in fringe villages of Nameri Tiger Reserve which also had higher number of host tree species diversity with higher basal area and density as compared to that of villages distant from Nameri Tiger Reserve. Gekko gecko was sighted on a total of 30 trees (6 species, 2 families), the highest being Ficus rumphii (40%). Maximum sightings of Gekko gecko was done on trees (67%). The occurrence of Gekko gecko was highly influenced by distance from forest (12%), followed by source of income (11%) and gender (4%). The majority of the respondents (53.54%) revealed that Gekko gecko occurred naturally in the homegardens implying that homegardens provided the habitat that can support the populations of Gekko gecko. But 46.45% of the respondents reported that they were adopted (62.16% in villages distant from Nameri Tiger Reserve), which raises serious concerns about the conservation of Gekko gecko in homegardens. Though, majority of the people knew that it is illegal to trade Gekko gecko, the financial benefits of its trade is very alluring. To make homegardens more favourable for the survival of Gekko gecko there should be strict law enforcement, upgradation of the species in the IUCN Red List and options for alternative livelihood.

For India's forest-dependent communities, Non-Timber Forest Products (NTFPs) are a major source of income and survival. NTFPs collection and their varieties differ season to season. However, little attention has been given on the income variation according to the seasons and various socio-economic factors influencing it. The present study examined the household income of the forest dwelling communities from NTFPs and their relation to the time spent for its collection in three different seasons i.e., summer, winter and rainy. We interviewed randomly selected families of the forest-dependent communities living in the forest fringe areas of Jaldapara National Park (JNP), West Bengal state of India located in the Eastern Himalayas using a semi-structured questionnaire. The average annual household income of the communities was greatly affected by NTFPs obtained during the rainy season. The majority of the households supplemented their total annual household income through NTFPs (1–20% of total family income annually). In the rainy season, the majority of the respondents (75%) spent 1–10 days for NTFPs collection, the time spent significantly influenced their household income. Furthermore, we found that socio-economic variables such as age, education, and family size have an effect on total annual household income from NTFPs. The other variable also influenced the family income is time spent, in terms of number of days expended in NTFP collection during summer and winter seasons. The study affirms the contribution of NTFPs in family income is strongly determined by the period spent in the collection, which also varies with season and socio-economic variables of the inhabitants.

The Water Quality Index is one of the most effective tools to communicate information on the quality of water to the people. An attempt was made to assess the annual and seasonal status of Surajkund and Rani Pond, Aurangabad, Bihar, India using the overall Index of Pollution and Water Quality Index from November 2017 to October 2019. The values of eleven parameters namely water temperature, pH, electrical conductivity, dissolved oxygen, biochemical oxygen demand, total alkalinity, hardness, total dissolved solids, chloride, nitrate and fluoride were calculated following standard methodology. A statistically significant difference was found among these parameters. The values were compared with the standard to determine the overall Index of Pollution and Water Quality Index. Results indicated that electrical conductivity, total alkalinity and total dissolved solid were higher than prescribed limits. The values 1.5–3.50 of the overall Index of Pollution estimated that the average status of water of Surajkund was acceptable (C2) but Rani Pond and Surajkund during the summer season were slightly polluted (C3). The values 74.18–233.89 of the Water Quality Index inferred that the average status of water of Surajkund and Rani Pond was slightly polluted (C3). However, on a seasonal basis, the water quality of Surajkund was acceptable (C2) but Rani Pond was slightly polluted (C3) to polluted (C4). The results revealed anthropogenic activity and entry of untreated sewage in these water bodies. The water quality felt the necessity to adopt proper management policy and conservation efforts to these water bodies.

Surrogate-based-constrained optimization for some optimization problems involving computationally expensive objective functions and constraints is still a great challenge in the optimization field. Its difficulties are of two primary types. One is how to handle the constraints, especially, equality constraints; another is how to sample a good point to improve the prediction of the surrogates in the feasible region. Overcoming these difficulties requires a reliable constraint-handling method and an efficient infill-sampling strategy. To perform inequality- and equality-constrained optimization of expensive black-box systems, this work proposes a hybrid surrogate-based-constrained optimization method (HSBCO), and the main innovation is that a new constraint-handling method is proposed to map the feasible region into the origin of the Euclidean subspace. Thus, if the constraint violation of an infeasible solution is large, then it is far from the origin in the Euclidean subspace. Therefore, all constraints of the problem can be transformed into an equivalent equality constraint, and the distance between an infeasible point and the origin in the Euclidean subspace represents the constraint violation of the infeasible solution. Based on the distance, the objective function of the problem can be penalized by a Gaussian penalty function, and the original constrained optimization problem becomes an unconstrained optimization problem. Thus, the feasible solutions of the original minimization problem always have a lower objective function value than any infeasible solution in the penalized objective space. To improve the optimization performance, kriging-based efficient global optimization (EGO) is used to find a locally optimal solution in the first phase of HSBCO, and starting from this locally optimal solution, RBF-model-based global search and local search strategies are introduced to seek global optimal solutions. Such a hybrid optimization strategy can help the optimization process converge to the global optimal solution within a given maximum number of function evaluations, as demonstrated in the experimental results on 23 test problems. The method is shown to achieve the global optimum more closely and efficiently than other leading methods.

The study of foraging behaviour of butterflies has been an important focus among the lepidopterists for years. Although established as invasive weed plant, the role Lantana camara as an important host plant as well as a food plant for the butterfly species is now well-known. The present study aims to interpret the role of morphological variables of the visitor butterflies in relation to their foraging behaviour on Lantana camara. Butterflies with longer proboscis were more efficient in foraging on flowers of Lantana camara than the butterflies with shorter ones, when the species containing proboscis same as or longer than their body length were excluded. Longer relative proboscis length (RPL) have selective advantage for foraging over Lantana camara up to a certain point (RPL = 0.881) and after that larger relative proboscis length often obstructs foraging behaviour as the handling time increases and these butterflies face more resistance against incoming nectar than the others.The residuals (body weight-wing span) also act as important factor.The handling time of the butterflies on Lantana camara shows a negative relationship with the residuals. The findings suggests that in case of Lantana camara as a nectaring plant butterfly species with longer proboscis have selective advantage for exploitation of the resource than the species with shorter ones and plantation of Lantana camara may be useful for conserving the long tongued butterfly species.

The tuber necrotic strain of Potato virus Y (PVYNTN) causes widespread disease and has severe negative effects on the growth and yields of plants, especially those of the Solanaceae family. The consequences of residual toxicity and non-biodegradation of synthetic chemicals and pollution of the environment has led to investigations into new non-toxic and biological treatments to control plant viral diseases. Ethanolic extracts of Bowiea volubilis (bulbs), Cotyledon orbiculata (leaves), Gomphocarpus fruticosus (leaves), Merwilla plumbea (dry and fresh bulbs), Nerium oleander (leaves), and the fruits and leaves of Strophanthus speciosus, were evaluated against PVYNTN in vivo and in vitro. At a concentration of 20 mg · ml−1, ethanolic extracts of Strophanthus speciosus (leaves) and fruits (50 mg · ml−1) significantly reduced the expression of PVYNTN symptoms on tobacco plants in vitro without affecting the normal growth and development of the plant. Similarly, at 50 mg · ml−1, N. oleander, C. orbiculata and B. volubilis (fresh bulbs) and S. speciousus leaves at 20 mg · ml−1 extracts showed significant differences in PVYNTN symptoms in the in vivo experiment. Strophanthus speciosus leaf and fruit extracts showed significant inhibition in the in vitro and in vivo assays and demonstrated that S. speciosus has potential to be used as an antiphytoviral treatment.

The widespread of invasive plants across the world has increased the risk of extinction of native plants. It is then necessary for understanding the ecological impacts of invasive plants on neighbouring plant communities where they are found. This study aimed to assess the impacts of the abundance of Pneumatopteris afra on plant diversity of some invaded wetlands in Lafia, Nigeria. Three wetlands with size 500 × 500 m2 each were chosen. Forty 1.5 m × 1.5 m quadrats were laid at 10 m intervals across four 200 m transects at each wetland. The abundance of each plant species within the quadrats was counted and was used to estimate the diversity indices. The impact of the abundance of P. afra on the wetland communities was determined using Pearson correlation coefficients and linear regression models. A total of nine neighbouring plant species including P. afra were identified in all the sites. P. afra has the highest relative frequency and abundance in all the sites. Shannon and Simpson's diversity indices of all the sites are less than 2 showing that they are less diverse. The abundance of P. afra exhibited negative relationships with the diversity indices. Regression models also showed inverse relationships between P. afra and the diversity indices. The colonization of these wetlands by P. afra might be due to its ability to maximize disturbances and limit the growth and expansion of surrounding plants.

A set of 45 diverse Asian and African origin/bred populations of pearl millet were investigated multi-locationally for morphological traits including grain yield and assessed for their fertility restoration ability on three cytoplasmic male sterility (CMS) systems in two contrasting seasons. Significant genetic variation was found for all the yield linked traits. Multivariate analysis for grain yield and its component traits grouped these populations into five clusters. Most of the Asian origin populations grouped into single cluster (Cluster III) and separated from the rest of the African origin populations indicating the presence of correspondence between clustering pattern and geographical origin of the populations. Clusters dominated with Asian populations (As-As) had linkages with early flowering, short plant height, more number of tillers, small and thin panicles, small seeded and low grain yield compared to the clusters dominated by African populations (Af-Af) or African origin and Asian bred (Af-As) populations. Genetically related populations having common parentage were found grouped in same clusters. Fertility restoration/maintainer frequency of 45 populations on three diverse CMS systems revealed that overall fertility restoration frequency was highest for A1 (86%) followed by A4 (37%) and for A5 (7%) CMS system. Five populations were identified as potential sources for developing maintainer lines for all three CMS systems and eight populations were identified specifically for A4 and A5 CMS systems. A set of 11 and four populations were identified for restorer line development exclusively for A1 and A5 CMS system, respectively. Six populations were identified for the development of dual restorers for both A1 and A4 CMS system.

The spatial distributions of heavy metals, magnetic susceptibility and granulometric contents have been assessed for beach and intertidal sectors of North-East coast of Tamilnadu, India. Metal concentrations and magnetic susceptibility are high, moderate and low in WER, MER and LER respectively. The measured concentrations are compared with background and toxicological reference values, results insist that in both sectors adverse biological effect is possible in some sites due to the excess Ni and Pb. Calculated three different indexes (PLI, PER and mERM-Q) indicate that in beach and intertidal samples shows moderate and low degree of potential ecological risk respectively. The studied metals might have 21% probability of being toxic in both sectors. Studied metal concentrations, calculated indexes, magnetic susceptibility and clay content are low in intertidal sector. Dominant factors for calculated indexes have been assessed in both sectors. In both cases, all the calculated indexes are positively (low) correlated with magnetic susceptibility and clay.

Herbal cosmetics are a valuable gift of nature and their demand is increasing in the world market. They have good activity with no side effects as compared to synthetic cosmetics. Herbal cosmetics are beauty products and because of natural ingredients, they possess desirable physiological activities. The present research work aimed to formulate and characterize cost-effective herbal nourishment cream containing Aloe vera gel and tomato powder. Four formulations i.e. F1, F2, F3, and F4 were prepared with varying concentrations of Aloe vera gel and tomato powder, while the composition of the cream base was kept the same. The oil phase of the cream base consisted of liquid paraffin (5.0 ml), stearic acid (4.8 g) and coconut oil (3.0 ml). The aqueous phase consisted of triethanolamine (1.5 ml), glycerin (5.0 ml), citric acid (0.4 g), methylparaben (0.1 g), water (q.s.) and key ingredients. The concentration of Aloe vera gel was 2.0 ml, 4.0 ml, 6.0 ml, 8.0 ml and the concentration of tomato powder was 0.2 g, 0.4 g, 0.6 g, 0.8 g in F1, F2, F3, and F4 respectively. The characterization of the formulated creams was carried out by standard methods, such as homogeneity test, smear type, irritancy test, pH test, spreadability test and acid value test. The stability test was carried out at different temperature conditions at 40 °C, below 5 °C and room temperature. All creams were homogeneous, non-irritant and easily removable. The pH of creams was in the range of 7.3–7.6 which is safe for human skin. Spreadability was in the range of 9–13. Acid values of the prepared creams were 5.6, 5.6, 6.4 and 7.2 respectively. Stability was examined by two parameters, homogeneity and pH change. The economical herbal creams prepared by using fewer chemicals are good for skin with moisturizing properties. The efficiency of creams can be improved by increasing the concentration of Aloe vera gel and tomato powder.

Corbett Tiger Reserve (CTR) supports several important species such as the tiger (Panthera tigris), leopard (Panthera pardus), elephant (Elephas maximus), and sambar (Cervus unicolor). Some of the species are involved in crop damage, livestock depredation, and human injuries or causalities, causing economic and social losses. Tigers and leopards are perceived as the major threat, causing economic losses to the people living around the protected areas (PAs), because of livestock depredation. Alternatively, the local community also draws benefits from the forest, which are seldom considered part of their economy. Here, we assessed the economic losses and benefits to the people at the northern periphery of the CTR based on semi-structured questionnaire survey of 301 respondents in 26 villages, between January and June 2018. We also determined the socio-economic factors associated with forest dependency using Ordinary Least Square regression (OLS). Most respondents (98%) reported reliance on the forest for fuelwood, fodder, and cattle grazing. Income from forest resources (US$ 1102.2 ± 63.6/hh/yr) 2 contributed significantly to the livelihood of the people (26.5 ± 1.3%). The income from fuelwood (US$ 188.1 ± 2.2/hh/yr), fodder (US$ 335.0 ± 10.0/hh/yr) and livestock grazing (US$ 618.1 ± 59.9/hh/yr) contributed 5.6 ± 0.3%, 9.3 ± 0.6%, and 11.6 ± 1%, respectively, to the household's total income. Reliance on forest resources was positively associated with the number of livestock and female participation in resource extraction, and negatively with the employment, age, education of respondents, and use of modern source of energy -Liquid Petroleum Gas. People incurred a cost of US$ 110.5 ± 4.7/hh/yr due to livestock depredation. It was estimated that benefits drawn from the forest exceed the losses incurred due to livestock depredation. Therefore, we recommend that a cost-benefit analysis is essential before designing conflict mitigation strategies. Since the compensatory schemes in India have largely struggled to achieve their objectives, it is, therefore, emphasised to find other measures, such as payment of ecosystem services (PES), to reduce conflict for maintaining a peaceful co-existence of human and carnivores.

Heavy metal resistance (Cu, Zn, Fe, Cr, Pb, Cd) and removal capacities of 19 selected actinobacteria strains were performed in order to investigate their applicability as bioremediators for polluted areas. Streptomyces sp. WR1L1S8 was used in the present investigation as heavy metals removing strain, which was isolated from inner tissu of the marine brown algae Fucus sp., and identified based on polyphasic and molecular characterization. The results showed that WR1L1S8 could successfully remove Fe2+, Cu2+ and Zn2+ by 60.74%, 42% and 39.02%, respectively, using Atomic Absorption Spectroscopy (AAS) analysis. The strain WR1L1S8 had a considerable tolerance to initial Cu2+ with a minimum inhibitory concentration value recorded at 250 mg L−1. Rotatable Central Composite Design (CCD) was used to optimize the copper removal yield using nutrient broth in batch experiment studying the influence of four operating parameters: incubation time, stirring speed, inoculum size and percentage of seawater. The optimal conditions were found at incubation time of 9 days under 114.9 rpm of a stirring speed, 18 agar cylinders as inoculum and 80.75% of seawater reaching a removal capacity of 75.24% which correspond to 29.65% increase compared with the non-optimized conditions. WR1L1S8 exhibited a promising potential for copper removal from aqueous solutions.

Garam Chashma valley is a mountainous valley situated in the Hindukush mountain range in Pakistan. This area is blessed with rich and diverse medicinal flora extensively utilized by the local community to cure health issues. The present article aims to explore and document the indigenous traditional knowledge about wild plants and their curative properties. This survey was carried out during April 2018 to September 2019. Data was collected from 153 indigenous people through semi structure questionnaire, group discussion, field survey and formal talks with elder people. Quantitative analysis of recorded data was obtained by applying quantitative indices like Frequency of Citation (FC) Use Reports (UR), Family Use Value (FUV), Informant Consensus Factor (ICF), Use Value (UV) and Relative Frequency of Citation (RFC). About 83 plant taxa belonging to 36 different families were recorded for the treatment of 95 different disorders grouped into sixteen disease categories. Herbs were the most leading plant habit (81.9%) and dried plant material (51.8%) usually preferred for therapeutics uses. Among families Asteraceae (16.86%) was recorded as major taxon with highest number of species followed by Lamiaceae (12.06%). Leaves 33% were recorded most abundantly used plant part followed by flowers (17%). Regarding to formulations, decoction (39.3%) and powder (17.1%) were recorded most frequent mode of preparation while oral intake (78%) was most preferred administration route. About (40%) plants species were utilized to treat Gastrointestinal diseases (GIT) disorders. Informant consensus revealed that Gastrointestinal disorders and Dermatological disorders were top ranked ailments categories with 0.94 consensus. The current study imparted that medicinal plants are still used by the indigenous communities of Garam Chashma valley, district lower Chitral, Pakistan. Thus, this investigation provides basis for the conservation of medicinal flora in the area. Medicinal plants (MPs) having high value of FC, RFC, UV, FUV, FL and ICF should be further study for phytochemistry and ethnopharmacology to evaluate novel active ingredients for new drugs discovery.

India is an emerging basil essential oil producer in South-east Asia. Two high essential oil yielding hybrids, namely one inter specific hybrid between of O. basilicum and O. kilimandscharicum Gurke (HYBL-1) and another intraspecific hybrid of O. basilicum × O. basilicum (OBL-1) of basil were analyzed using GC, enantiomeric GC, NMR, enantio-GC–MS and GC–MS methods. Inter specific hybrid HYBL-1 contained high essential oil-rich in linalool (68.5%), camphor (8%), and 1,8-cineole (4.6%) as characteristic constituents among monoterpenoids, whereas β-caryophyllene (1.9%), germacrene D (1.0%), and epi-α-cadinol (1.9%) were the sesquiterpenoids at the Lucknow (North Indian conditions) and linalool (71.8%), camphor (9.4%) and 1,8-cineole (4.3%) at Hyderabad (South Indian conditions) locations. Intraspecific hybrid (OBL-1) possessed linalool (66.1%), 1,8-cineole (5.4%) and geraniol (8.6%) with sesquiterpenoids in low proportions. Inter specific hybrid HYBL-1 showed superiority over OBL-1 in the multi-location trials conducted at Lucknow and Hyderabad. Average mean performance of inter specific hybrid over locations was: herb yield 44.80 t/ha, oil content 0.63%, oil yield 188.50 kg/ha, linalool content 67.65%, camphor content 8.90% v/s OBL-1 herb yield 21.32 t/ha, oil content 0.53%, oil yield 97.50 kg/ha, linalool content 65.55%, camphor content 0.00%, respectively. The essential oil of these two hybrids subjected to enantiomer differentiation revealed a high enantiomeric excess for (3R) -(−)-linalool, whereas (1R)- (+)-camphor was recorded exclusively in inter specific hybrid. The extensive NMR experiments were performed to confirm constituents in these hybrids and found that NMR spectroscopy could also be an ideal tool for the differentiation of essential oils from commercial samples declared as natural.

The potential of the parasitoid, Gronotoma micromorpha (Perkin) as a biological control agent for pea leafminer fly, Liriomyza huidobrensis (Blanchard) has been evaluated in a series of studies on the fly preference to host instars, biological characteristic and functional response to the host density. The studies were carried out at the Laboratory of Integrated Pest Management (IPMLab), Faculty of Agriculture Udayana University in Denpasar and Greenhouse Owned-Farmer in Pancasari Buleleng, Bali (1200 m asl; average temperature 23.67 ± 5.69 °C and average RH of 64 ± 17.69%). The results showed that G. micromorpha has a strong preference towards the 3rd instar larvae of L. huidobrensis. The pre-oviposition period was 0.4 ± 0.67d, oviposition was 12.5 ± 2.0d and post-oviposition period was 1 ± 0.0d while the peak oviposition occurred on the 4th day. Meanwhile, all the offsprings produced were females which indicated that parthenogenesis thelytokous was present in G. Micromorpha and the fecundity was 29 ± 3.77 per female adult. Furthermore, the average life span for the adult was 13 ± 1.42 days with an oviposition period of 12.5 ± 2.01 days. The average post-oviposition period was 1 ± 0.0 days and average development period of egg to adult was 32.03 ± 0.98 days. Meanwhile, the breeding potential was high with an average daily percentage of 2.27 ± 0.27 fecundity and a maximum spawning occurred on day 4. The functional response was type-2 and it is the rate at which parasitism increase with increase in population of the host density. Hence, the biological characteristics and mode of functional response by the parasitoid showed its potential as a biological pesticide for pea leafminer L. huidobrensis.

Background water shortage is the greatest significant reason controlling crop yield that harmfully affects fruit production, boll shedding, lint yield and fiber properties quality in cotton plants. Objectives: this study was carried out at Sakha Agricultural Research Station, Kafr El-Sheikh, Agric. Res. Center, Egypt, during 2014 and 2015 growing seasons. A study was undertaken in cotton (G. barbadense L.) to detect the magnitude of genetic divergence among parental cotton genotypes and their F1s cross combinations and to select most suitable combinations for tolerant water deficient. Results and conclusion: the data showed that the first eight main principal components with eigen value more than one are extracted from the complicated components, the total cumulative variance of these eight factors amount for about 85.28% of the total multivariate variance. Suggesting that these PCA scores might be used to summarize the original variables in any further analysis of the data. The female parent 10,229 formed wide cluster having wide divergent distance from the other groups. On the same trend, the extra-long varieties Giza 96 and Giza 45 formed unique groups, cluster number 8 and cluster 1 nearly related. Cluster number 7 and cluster 4 which consisted of two genotypes for each characterized by susstable to water deficit conditions. The cross combinations Giza 77 x Dandra, Giza 77 x Pima S6, Giza 96 x Australy and Minufy x Dandra grouped at the same cluster, however the cross combinations Giza 86 x Dandra and Giza 68 × 10,229 classified into two different clusters. The data revealed that the inter cluster distance was higher than the intra cluster, indicating wide genetic divergent among the studied genotypes. Principal components analysis is useful in identifying and most influential characters affecting genetic variation of population.

Ecological protection of grassland is an important part of the construction of ecological civilization in China. Grassland ecological compensation and reward policy is an important policy for grassland ecological protection in China. As the main participants in the grassland ecological compensation and reward policy, herders' behavioral response largely affects the effect of policy implementation. In this study, 550 herders in two regions with different compensation standards were selected as samples, and the comparative analysis of herdsmen's response to policy behavior and influence factors was carried out. The results showed that the grassland area owned by herders, ethnic group and perception of policies were important factors to affect the response of herdsmen's behavior in the two regions, but larger differences existed in the two regions. The grassland area and family size owned by herders are important factors that affect the response of herdsmen's behavior in Qinghai-Tibet Plateau; However, the ethnic group, the understanding of policy and family income are the important factors in the western desert area.

The present research evaluated the phytoremediation potential of three selected plant species Tamarix. spp, Haloxylon. spp and Malcolmia Africana to remediate gold mine tailings in the center of Iran. To improve the ecological capability of the tailing dam and contaminated soil, two treatments of contaminated (tailing dam) and control (surrounding area of the gold mine) were chosen. The associated tailing and plants' shoot and root samples were collected and analyzed for total metal concentrations of Cobalt, Chromium, Strontium, Thorium, Titanium and Uranium. Translocation Factor (TF), BioAccumulation Coefficient (BAC) and Bioconcentration Factor (BCF) were estimated to assess the plant species potential for phytoremediation. Results indicated that Tamarix. spp showed the best growth on contaminated site (by height of 44.05 cm and weight of 105.3 mg) as compared to Haloxylon. spp and Malcolmia Africana. Metal accumulation rate was observed to be maximized in all three species; by 28.37%, 35.5% and 12.96% of Sr and 20.28%, 9.85% and 31.7% of Ti for Tamarix. Spp, Haloxylon. Spp and Malcolmia Africana, respectively. The study showed that Malcolmia Africana is the best accumulator of Strontium with TF, BAC and BCF of higher than one for both control and contaminated treatments. Also Tamarix. spp can translocate large amounts of Strontium, Thorium, Titanium and Uranium from roots to shoots as well as Strontium and Titanium for Haloxylon. spp.

Accelerated soil erosion is a major threat to soil, and there are great variations in the rate of soil erosion over time due to natural and human-induced factors. The temperate forest zone of Russia is characterized by complex stages of land-use history (i.e. active urbanization, agricultural development, land abandonment, etc.). We have for the first time estimated the rates of soil erosion by the WaTEM/SEDEM model (rainfall erosion) and by a regional model (snowmelt erosion) over the past 250 years (from 1780 to 2019) for a 100-km2 study site in the Moscow region of Russia. The calculations were made on the basis of a detailed historical reconstruction of the following factors: the location of the arable land, crop rotation, the rain erosivity factor, and the maximum snow water equivalent. The area of arable land has decreased more than 3.5-fold over the past 250 years. At the end of the 20th century, the rates of gross erosion had declined more than 5.5-fold (from 28 × 103 to 5 × 103 tˑha−1ˑyr−1) in comparison with the end of the 18th century. Changes in the boundaries of arable land and also the relief features had led to a significant intra-slope accumulation of sediments. As a result of sediment redeposition within the arable land, the variation in net soil erosion was significantly lower than the variation in gross soil erosion. The changes in arable land area and in crop composition are the factors that have to the greatest extent determined the changes in soil erosion in this territory.

Maps of erosivity, which are also commonly referred to as isoerodent maps, have played a critical role in soil conservation efforts in the United States and around the world. Currently available erosivity maps for the United States are either outdated, conflict with erosivity benchmarking studies, or utilized less advanced spatial mapping methods. Furthermore, it is possible that the same underlying issues with US maps are impacting global maps as well. In this study, we used more than 3400 15-min, fixed-interval precipitation gauges to update the isoerodent map of the conterminous United States. Erosivity values were interpolated using universal kriging under several spatial model configurations and resolutions. The optimal spatial model was selected based on which result had the lowest sample variogram error. Rainfall, erosivity, and erosivity density maps were compared to existing products. Some average annual and annual erosivity results were compared to high-quality erosivity benchmarking publications. Erosivity values from both RUSLE2 and Panagos et al. (2017) were generally lower in the eastern United States and mixed in the western United States compared to our results. Topographic effects resulted in much greater erosivity differences in this study as compared to prior maps. Benchmark comparisons revealed that erosivity maps from this study and others were lower than the benchmark by 14% or more (up to 38%). These findings suggest current practices of storm omission and intensity dampening correction need to be revisited, especially in locations with relatively low-to-moderate rainfall erosivity such as the Midwest or Northeast United States, for example.

Environmental monitoring of small, rural watersheds was one of the components of the Natural Resources Management and Rural Poverty Alleviation Program (RS-Rural) in southern Brazil. The purpose of the monitoring was to assess the impact of promoting soil conservation and environment management practices adopted by farmers and funded by the Program. In four small monitored watersheds, in a total of 95 plots representing distinct land use and soil management, surface soil was collected to characterize ground-zero of the Program by determining several soil physical, chemical and microbiological properties. Principal component analysis (PCA) shows soil physical, chemical and biological properties were decisive in defining the agricultural soils in the rural watersheds with family farming. The sensitivity to chemical properties provides an opportunity to improve soil quality if soil management focuses on altering those properties. Soil management practiced by tobacco farmers leads to rapid, intense degradation of some natural soil properties, especially those related to the dynamics of soil organic matter, compared with more conservationist uses (forest, regrowth, and grassland). Thus, soil management must be reoriented to avoid the progress of degradation and recover soil physical and biological quality. Cover crops and by land-abandonment to allow natural vegetation are important management strategies for the degraded soils used for tobacco production, increasing soil organic matter, nutrients and microbial activity and thus allowing further crop production. In conclusion, watersheds with tobacco cropping have soils with lower quality than when under no-tillage grain production, requiring changes in land use and soil management.

The hydrological conditions near the soil surface influence the soil erosion process, as determined by the soil erodibility and critical shear stress. The soil erodibility and critical shear stress of saturated purple soil slopes were computed and compared with those of unsaturated purple soil slopes. The detachment capacities computed through the numerical method (NM), modified numerical method (MNM) and analytical method (AM), from rill erosion experiments on saturated purple soil slopes at different flow rates (2, 4, and 8 L min−1) and slope gradients (5, 10, 15, and 20°), were used to comparatively compute the soil erodibility and critical shear stress. The computed soil erodibilities and critical shear stresses were also compared with those of unsaturated purple soil slopes. At the different slope gradients ranging from 5° to 20°, there were no significant differences in the soil erodibilities of the saturated purple soil and also in those of the unsaturated purple soil. The critical shear stresses slightly varied with the slope gradients. The saturated purple soil was relatively significantly more susceptible to erosion. The NM overestimated the soil erodibility of both saturated and unsaturated soils by 31% and underestimated the critical shear stress. The MNM yielded the same soil erodibility and critical shear stress values as the AM. The results of this study supply parameters for modeling rill erosion of saturated purple soil slope.

Water erosion process induces differences to the nitrogen (N) functional microbial community structure, which is the driving force to key N processes at soil-water interface. However, how the soil N transformations associated with water erosion is affected by microorganisms, and how the microbial respond, are still unclear. The objective of this study is to investigate the changes of microbial diversity and community structure of the N-cycle function microorganisms as affected by water erosion under application of organic manure and straw cover. On the basis of iso-nitrogen substitution, four treatments were set up: 1) only chemical fertilizer with N 150 kg ha−1, P2O5 60 kg ha−1 and K2O 90 kg ha−1 (CK); the N was substituted 20% by 2) organic manure (OM); 3) straw (SW); and 4) organic manure + straw (1:1) (OMSW). The results showed that applying organic manure and straw to sloping farmland can increase soil N contents, but reduce runoff depth, Kw, sediment yield and N loss, especially in the OMSW. Straw cover and straw + organic manure increased the diversity (Chao1) of nitrifier (AOB), and both diversity and uniformity (Shannon) of denitrifier (nirK/S) were increased in the OMSW. All erosion control measures reduced N-fixing bacteria diversity and increased their uniformity, and the combined application of organic manure and straw cover was a better erosion control measure than the single application of them. Improved soil chemistry and erodibility were the main drives for the changes of N-functional microbial community structure and the appearance of dominant bacteria with different organic materials.

Soil erosion is a serious environmental problem arising from agricultural intensification and landscape changes. Improper land management coupled with intense rainfall has intricated the problem in most parts of the Ethiopian highlands. Soil loss costs a profound amount of the national GDP. Thus, quantifying soil loss and prioritizing areas for conservation is imperative for proper planning and resource conservation. Therefore, this study has modeled the mean soil loss and annual sediment yield of the Gumara watershed. Landsat 5 TM, Landsat 7ETM+, and Landsat 8 OLI were used for land use land cover (LULC) change analysis. Besides these, other datasets related to rainfall, digital soil map, Digital Elevation Model, reference land use, and cover (LULC) ground truth points were used to generate parameters for modeling soil loss. The watershed was classified into five major land-use classes (water body, cultivated land, grazing land, built-up and forest and plantation) using a maximum likelihood algorithm covering a period of the last 30 years (1988–2019). The mean annual soil loss and sediment yield were quantified using RUSLE, Sediment delivery ratio (SDR), and Sediment Yields models (SY). The analysis result unveils that within the past 30 years, the watershed has undergone significant LULC changes from forest & plantation (46.33%) and grazing land to cultivated land (31.59%) with the rate of −1.42km2yr-1 and -2.80km2yr-1 respectively. In the same vein, the built-up area has expanded to cultivated and grazing land. Subsequently, nearly 15% (207 km2) of the watershed suffered from moderate to very severe soil loss. On average, the watershed losses 24.2 t ha−1 yr−1 of soil and yields 2807.02 t ha−1 yr−1 sediment. Annually, the watershed losses 385,157 t ha−1 yr−1 soil from the whole study area. Among the admirative districts, Farta (Askuma, Giribi, Mahidere Mariam and Arigo kebeles), Fogera (Gazen Aridafofota and Gura Amba kebeles), East Este (Witimera kebele), and Dera (Gedame Eyesus and Deriana Wechit kebeles) districts which cover 50% of the watershed were found severely affected by soil erosion. Thus, to curve back this scenario, soil and water conservation practices should prioritize in the aforementioned districts of the watersheds.

Amending croplands with forest residues may help in restoring soil properties in fields subject to intensive land management. Despite their known benefits when applied separately, co-application of wood biochar with paper mill biosolids (PB) has seen little investigation under field conditions. A study was initiated in Québec, QC, Canada, to determine the effect of a single application of wood biochar with and without PB on the nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) availability of two pH-neutral to alkaline loamy soils. Biochar at 0, 10, and 20 Mg dry weight·ha−1 and PB at 30 Mg wet weight·ha−1 were applied before planting of corn (Zea mays L.) and soybean [Glycine max (L.) Merr.] in 2018. Residual effect of this co-application was determined under soybean and corn in the subsequent year. In both years, corn received supplemental N and P from mineral fertilizers according to local agronomic recommendations. Co-applying biochar and PB reduced soil NO3-N availability in the year of application and decreased corn yield by 1.0 Mg·ha−1 compared with biochar or PB applied alone, but these amendments did not affect soybean yields. In the following year, the previous biochar addition increased soybean yield by 0.6 Mg·ha−1 but had little effect on corn. For both years, biochar addition induced a large increase in soil Mehlich-3 P. This study revealed that wood biochar positively impacted P status of these soils but was not a source of N to crops even when co-applied with PB.

Biochar is a source of stable organic matter being explored as a manure additive. A 64 d incubation experiment was conducted to quantify the short-term effect of manure (RM), biochar–manure (BM), raw biochar (BC), RM + BC, and BM + BC amendment on soil carbon (C) and nitrogen (N) mineralization. Manure increased CO2-C emission rates, with the highest cumulative CO2-C emissions being observed for RM + BC. Treatments with BM halted soil C mineralization, indicating manure-C stabilization. By contrast, neither RM nor BM affected soil N mineralization. Applying BM might benefit soil C sequestration by lowering CO2-C emissions over the long term.

Tracheid length and width patterns from pith to bark at a height of 0.6 m in uneven-aged Norway spruce (Picea abies L. (H.) Karst) trees were addressed. The identification of the main factors and a comparison with even-aged stands were also pursued. 96 trees were sampled from experimental stands in Southern Finland. The material encompassed the variation in tracheid properties from early years to silvicultural maturity, i.e. from corewood to outerwood up to a cambial age of 111 years. Data from 39 Norway spruce trees from even-aged stands we utilized for comparison. Models fitted to the data indicated that annual ring widths did not influence mean tracheid dimensions but the latewood proportion showed a significant influence on tracheid dimensions. Tracheids in uneven-aged stands were slightly wider and longer at the base of the stem with a similar tree diameter, cambial age, and annual ring number. Tracheid length and width patterns from pith to bark at a height of 0.6 m in uneven-aged Norway spruce (Picea abies (L.) Karst.) trees were studied. Identification of the main factors and a comparison with even-aged stands were also carried out. Ninety-six trees were sampled from experimental stands in southern Finland. The material encompassed the variation in tracheid properties from early years to silvicultural maturity, i.e., from corewood to outerwood up to a cambial age of 111 years. Data from 39 Norway spruce trees from even-aged stands were utilized for comparison. Models fitted to the data indicated that annual ring widths did not influence mean tracheid dimensions but that the latewood proportion had a significant influence on tracheid dimensions. Tracheids in uneven-aged stands were slightly wider and longer at the base of the stem in trees with a similar diameter, cambial age, and annual ring number.