Methane is an important greenhouse gas, and farmland is one of the im- portant emission sources of methane. Therefore, it's important to study the discharge of methane from cropland. This paper reviewed the methane emission from agricultural ecosystem, the factors controlling CH4 fluxes from soil, such as water regime, the soil characteristics, and the type and amount of applied fertilizers and so on, the management for mitigation of CH4 emission from cropland, especially from paddy field, and put forward some research suggestions on methane emission in the future. The objective of this paper is to provide reference for controlling methane emission in cropland.
Annual ryegrass(Lolium multiflorum Lam.), a non-leguminous winter cover crop, has been adopted to absorb soil native N to minimize N loss from an intensive double rice cropping system in southern China, but a little is known about its effects on rice grain yield and rice N use efficiency. In this study, effects of ryegrass on double rice yield, N uptake and use efficiency were measured under different fertilizer N rates. A 3-year(2009–2011) field experiment arranged in a split-plot design was undertaken. Main plots were ryegrass(RG) as a winter cover crop and winter fallow(WF) without weed. Subplots were three N treatments for each rice season: 0(N_0), 100(N_(100)) and 200 kg N ha–1(N_(200)). In the 3-year experiment, RG reduced grain yield and plant N uptake for early rice(0.4–1.7 t ha–1 for grain yield and 4.6–20.3 kg ha–1 for N uptake) and double rice(0.6–2.0 t ha–1 for grain yield and 6.3–27.0 kg ha–1 for N uptake) when compared with WF among different N rates. Yield and N uptake decrease due to RG was smaller in N_(100) and N_(200) plots than in N_0 plots. The reduction in early rice grain yield in RG plots was associated with decrease number of panicles. Agronomic N use efficiency and fertilizer N recovery efficiency were higher in RG plots than winter fallow for early rice and double rice among different N rates and experimental years. RG tended to have little effect on grain yield, N uptake, agronomic N use efficiency, and fertilizer N recovery efficiency in the late rice season. These results suggest that ryegrass may reduce grain yield while it improves rice N use efficiency in a double rice cropping system.