Impact of Irrigation and Fertigation Levels on Growth, Yield Components and Yield of Aerobic Rice (Oryza sativa L.) under Drip System

Abstract

Back ground: More than half of the world’s population depends on rice, which is grown in transplanting conditions. Due to the global water crisis, irrigated rice systems are no longer sustainable. Therefore, cultivating aerobic rice with drip irrigation and fertigation meets the crop water and nutrient requirements, results in the optimal yield. Method: A field experiment was conducted during summer 2022 and 2023 at Research Farm of Wetland in Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, Coimbatore, to evaluate the performance of aerobic rice under drip irrigation and fertigation levels on growth and yield of Co-51 variety. The experiment was laid out in randomized complete block design with combination of thirteen treatments, replicated thrice. Results: Among different treatments, drip fertigation @ 100% PE up to 30 DAS+150% PE up to 60 DAS+ 200% PE up to 90 DAS with 125% RDF (25% through NF+75% through WSF) resulted significantly superior growth characters viz., higher plant height (92.54 and 95.95 cm), no. of tiller m-2(469.78 and 478.42), total drymatter production m-2 (988.21 and 1025.42 g m-2), no. of filled grains panicle-1 (107.5 and 114.5), total no. of grains panicle-1 (122.6 and 127.1), fertility percentage (87.7% and 90.1%) and lower no. of ill filled grains panicle-1 (15.1 and 12.6), grain yield (4316 and 4446 kg ha-1) and straw yield (5528 and 5775 kg ha-1) as compared to others, during summer 2022 and 2023, respectively.