Abstract: | A long-term experiment of minimal and zero tillages was carried out on the sandy loam soil from 1985~1996. The results showed that the yields of minimal tillaged rice and wheat were similar to those by conventional tillage. Zero-tillaged wheat yield increased by 5.3% on average, while the zero-tillaged rice yield reduced by 2. 2%. The yields under long-term minimal and zero tillages showed no obvious temporal trend. After five years of the experiment, the soil organic matter contents were in steady state under different tillages, but its distributions in soil layers were different markedly and the richness in upper layer was observed under minimal and zero tillages, with the richness coefficients of 1. 1140 and 1. 1608, on 7-year average ,respectively. The bulk densities among different tillages were insignificantly different in soil layers of 0~7cm and 14~21cm. In the soil layer of 7~14cm,the bulk densities under conventional, minimal and zero tillages were 1.348,1.412 and 1. 410 g/cm3 respectively, minimal and zero tillages resulted in obvious increases in the bulk density. |