The wetland soils in the state of Rio Grande do Sul present wide variation in their morphological, physical, chemical and mineralogical characteristics due to the heterogeneity of the parent material and different degrees of hydromorphism. Since their main uses for flooded rice and cattle breeding are frequently low-profit activities, the introduction of dry land crop species in rotation and/or succession with flooded rice has been called for. By broadening the spectrum of wetland soil use, a better weed control for flooded rice and an enhanced physical state of the degraded soil by management systems of reduced soil disturbance would become possible. In this context, the effect of tillage systems on the aggregation state of an Albaqualf has been evaluated: conventional tillage (CT), minimum tillage (MT), no tillage (NT) and pre-germinated (PG), by means of the following attributes: distribution of stable water aggregates in different size classes and mean weight diameter (MWD) of the aggregates. The experiment has been conducted since 1995/96 and is installed in the Estação Experimental de Terras Baixas (Experimental Station Lowlands-ESL) of Embrapa (Brazilian agricultural research organization), Clima Temperado, district of Capão do Leão (RS). After three years, the NT system favored an aggregate formation of larger sizes, originating largest MWD, while the system PG pushed the largest aggregate concentration of the soil into the smallest size class, with the smallest aggregate MWD. The MWD was lineal and positively correlated with the organic C, not presenting any correlation with the clay dispersed in water.
tillage system; aggregation; lowland soil
