The soil mechanical resistance to penetration shows high influence on vegetal development since the growth of the roots and the crops productivity change in the inversely proportional form with its value. The objective was to study the spatial variability and the correlation between maize yield (GP) and soil mechanical resistance to penetration (PR) of an Oxissol soil under conventional tillage, located at the Experimental Station of the Engineering College - FE/UNESP - Ilha Solteira, São Paulo State, Brazil. It was defined 133 points of sampling in the field, according to a grid with regular intervals of 10.0 m, for the attainment of PR, gravimetric moisture (GM), in the layers of 0-0.10; 0.10-0.20; 0.20-0.30 and 0.30-0.40 m, and the GP. The exponential model showed adequate to describe all the adjusted experimental semivariograms. The PR and GM showed moderate spatial dependence, with range varying between 20.2 to 63.0 m. The GP presented strong spatial dependence with range of 15.3 m. There was not a spatial correlation between PR and GP. Values of PR varying between 0.9 and 2.0 MPa did not limit the GP.
geostatistic; kriging; Zea mays
