Abstract
Being a maize producing region, cultivation of hybrid and improved maize varieties in the spring season is very low in Baitadi district. In order to examine the performances of different maize varieties, five maize varieties including both open-pollinated (i.e. Arun-2, Arun-4 and Rampur composite) and hybrid varieties (i.e. Rajkumar and Rampur Hybrid-10) were tested using Randomized Complete Block Design (RCBD) in spring season during February to August, 2020 at Dasarathch and municipality-1, Baitadi. The highest days to emergence of seedlings was in Rampur Hybrid-10 (30 days) and the lowest days to emergence was in Arun-2 (23 days) and Arun-4 (23 days), respectively. The plant height was significantly higher in Rajkumar (156.4 cm), whereas the leaf area index were significantly higher in Arun-2 (4.36 cm). Similarly, the phenological behavior like days to 50% tasseling (112 days) and silking (119 days) were significantly earlier in Arun-4. Likewise, yield attributing characteristics like cob length, cob diameter, number of rows/cobs, number of kernels/rows, shelling%, thousand grain weight (TGW) were found significantly higher in hybrid maize varieties as compared to openpollinated varieties. Grain yield was found significantly higher in hybrids Rajkumar recording yield of 5.32 Mt ha-1 closely followed by Rampur Hybrid-10 (4.75 Mt ha-1) whereas open-pollinated Rampur composite, Arun-2 and Arun-4 recorded grain yield of 4.58 Mt ha-1, 3.99 Mt ha-1 and 2.33 Mt ha-1 respectively. The results indicated that hybrid varieties were promising and should be promoted for general cultivation in the hills area of Nepal. SAARC J. Agric., 19(2): 123-136 (2021)
Highlights
INTRODUCTIONMaize (Zea mays L.) is one of the most important staple crop in the world. Globally it is a widely grown cereals which contribute to food security in most of the developing countries
Grain yield was found significantly higher in hybrids Rajkumar recording yield of 5.32 Mt ha-1 closely followed by Rampur Hybrid-10 (4.75 Mt ha-1) whereas open-pollinated Rampur composite, Arun-2 and Arun-4 recorded grain yield of 4.58 Mt ha-1, 3.99 Mt ha-1 and 2.33 Mt ha-1 respectively
Individual plot size was 4.2m × 2m and seeds were sown at spacing of 60cm × 25cm and all plots were fertilized with 120:60:40 kg NPK/ha full dose of di-ammonium phosphate (DAP) and murate of potash (MOP) at basal dose and 3 equal split doses of nitrogen i.e., at the time of sowing, at knee high stage and tasseling stage
Summary
Maize (Zea mays L.) is one of the most important staple crop in the world. Globally it is a widely grown cereals which contribute to food security in most of the developing countries. The cereal crops contribute about 49.41% to Agriculture Gross Domestic Product (AGDP), whereas, maize alone contributes 6.66% to AGD (MOALD, 2017). It is cultivated in 957,650 ha of land with total production of 2,835,674 Mt and productivity of 2.96 Mt ha-1 (AICC, 2021). Due to unavailability of high yielding genotypes of maize suitable to agro-climatic condition of Far-western development region (Prasai et al, 2015), farmers are reluctant to use improved seed varieties and most of them use local varieties without the replacement of seed for many years. This study was conducted in Baitadi in order to know about the performance and adoption of the high yielding hybrid and improved varieties in the spring season and further to increase the preferences of farmers to cultivate maize in spring season
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