Abstract
A field experiment was conducted at the Bangladesh Agricultural University (BAU) to find out possible effects of alternate wetting and drying irrigation (AWDI) on the yield, water use and water use efficiency (WUE) of Boro rice. The experimental layout was furnitured using split-plot design (SPD) with two modern varieties (MV) of rice viz. BRRIdhan 28 and BRRIdhan 29, which received four irrigation treatments randomly and was replicated thrice. The treatments ranged from continuous submergence (T1) of the field to a number of delayed irrigations (T2, T3 and T4) denoting application of 5 cm irrigation water when water level in the perforated PVC pipe fell 10, 20 and 30 cm below ground level (G.L.), respectively. The study revealed that treatment T1 attributed by the highest total water use (122.2 cm) and the lowest WUE (58.53 kg/ha/cm) produced the highest grain yield (6.86 t/ha). Treatment T2, on the contrary, gave the second highest yield (6.58 t/ha) and consequently the second highest WUE (69.48 kg/ha/cm) indicating quite a large water saving (15 cm) compared to treatment T1. The yields in treatments T3 (6.27 t/ha) and T4 (5.86 t/ha) were significantly lower at 1% level of significance compared to that of treatment T1. No significant effect was found either for the treatment or for the varieties on the number of effective and total tillers hill-1 nor did they affect 1000 grain weight. Reduced plant height, no. of effective tillers hill-1, grain yield, straw yield, biological yield and harvest index were found with the increasing water stress. Key words: Alternate wetting and drying irrigation; Boro rice; Yield; Water use efficiency DOI: 10.3329/jbau.v6i2.4841 J. Bangladesh Agril. Univ. 6(2): 409-414, 2008
Highlights
Due to increasing scarcity of freshwater resources available for irrigated agriculture and escalating demand of food around the world, in the future, it will be necessary to produce more food with less water
The objective could be outlined as to find out, from a number of AWDI irrigation treatments, the best one with the highest water use efficiency that would result in an insignificant yield loss and ensure the best use of the available water resources
Significant consequences of AWDI on the production of Boro rice were observed as given in Tables 1, 2 and 3
Summary
Due to increasing scarcity of freshwater resources available for irrigated agriculture and escalating demand of food around the world, in the future, it will be necessary to produce more food with less water. One method to save water in irrigated rice cultivation is the intermittent drying of the rice fields instead of keeping them continuously flooded. AWDI is one method that can increase the productivity of water at the field level by reducing seepage and percolation during the crop growing period.
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