Effect of Different Levels of Potash on Growth, Yield Attributes and Yields of Transplanted Kharif Rice (Oryza sativa L.) in Southern Odisha

Abstract

The occurrence of drought in the early monsoon period and the role of potassium in resisting water stress motivated me to imitate a field experiment which was conducted during Kharif, 2022-23 at the Post Graduate Research Farm (18.805378800N latitude, 84.1790850E longitude) of the M.S. Swaminathan School of Agriculture, Gajapati, Odisha, on a sandy clay loam soil. The experiment was laid out in Randomized Block Design with three replications and eight treatments. The treatments were: K0 (control) 0 Kg K ha-1, K10 :10 Kg K ha-1, K20: 20 Kg K ha-1, K30 : 30 Kg K ha-1, K40 : 40 Kg K ha-1, K50 : 50 Kg K ha-1, K60: 60 Kg K ha-1, K70 : 70 Kg K ha-1. Rice variety Shatabdi was the test crop. The recommended N and P2O5 (80-40 kg ha-1) were applied to all treatments. The effect of Potassium levels significantly influenced the crop growth parameters like the number of tillers, dry matter accumulation, leaf area index, number of panicles per unit area, panicle length, number of spikelet’s per panicle, number of filled spikelet’s per panicle, percentage of filled spikelet’s and finally grain and straw yields, the treatments K70 recorded best results in terms of dry matter accumulation (775g m-2), leaf area index (3.3), number of tillers m-2 (350.6), number of panicles m-2 (351.6), panicle length (29.6cm), number of spikelet’s panicle-1 (183), number of filled spikelet’s panicle-1 (163), percentage of filled spikelet’s (89.4)and grain and straw yields (5138kgha-1 and 6836 kgha-1, respectively). A continuous increasing trend was recorded with an increase in potassium level from K0 to K70. The harvest index efficiency was maximum under K40. In the present study, all parameters showed a positive response to an increase in potassium levels.