Abstract
Nitrogen fertilizer is an important component of crop production; however, its excessive application could result in N loss that could have serious environmental concerns. Straw incorporation in the soil after crop harvest is one of the most feasible straw management techniques, however, the optimization of nitrogen (N) fertilizer management and maize straw incorporation to modulate the crop yield and to maintain N balance in sweet corn is necessary to get better yields on a sustained basis. The present study was comprised of two straw management treatments i.e., (i) no straw return (S0), and (ii) incorporation of crushed corn ears by into the soil using rotary tiller (S100) and four N fertilizer management treatments i.e., (i) common farmer practice with total N applied at 300 kg ha−1 with 50%, 5%, 30%, and 15% splits at basal, 3-leaf stage (V3), at hilling stage (V8) and at tasseling/flowering stage (RT), respectively (FM); (ii) application of total N at 225 kg ha−1 with 40%, 10% and 50% at basal, 3-leaf stage (V3) and at hilling stage (V8), respectively (OMI); (iii) application of total N at 150 kg ha−1 with 40%, 10% and 50% at basal, 3-leaf stage (V3), and at hilling stage (V8), respectively (OMII); and (iv) the treatment without any fertilizer application (N0). The hybrid sweet corn cultivar ‘Yuetian 28’ was grown during the spring and autumn growing seasons of 2016 and 2017. The results showed that the N management treatments substantially improved the fresh ear yield, ear number and ear weight, partial factor productivity from nitrogen (PFPN), recovery efficiency from nitrogen (REN), and agronomic efficiency from nitrogen (AEN). Compared with FM, the OMI and OMII treatments significantly increased the AEN and PFPN whilst decreased the apparent N loss, however, the fresh ear yield, ear number and ear weight in OMI treatment were found to be statistically similar (p ˃ 0.05) to FM. Moreover, the S100 treatment did not affect the fresh ear yield and yield components significantly. Overall, straw return combined with an optimized N fertilizer application could improve the yield of sweet corn on a sustained basis with minimum and/or negligible N loss.
Highlights
Nitrogen (N) is a critical nutritional element for crops and is considered as one of the main limiting factors that substantially affects crop yields [1]
The local farmers are generally applying high doses of N-fertilizers in curse to get high yields [7,8], excessive N application could result in N loss into the environment, rather than its better uptake and utilization [9,10], which leads to serious environmental risks [11]
The fresh ear yield and ear weight in both growing seasons and the ear number in 2016spr decreased dramatically in OMII compared to fertilizer management (FM)
Summary
Nitrogen (N) is a critical nutritional element for crops and is considered as one of the main limiting factors that substantially affects crop yields [1]. The local farmers are generally applying high doses of N-fertilizers in curse to get high yields [7,8], excessive N application could result in N loss into the environment, rather than its better uptake and utilization [9,10], which leads to serious environmental risks [11]. The optimization of N application is needed in order to get better yields of sweet corn with reduced/minimum N loss, to make the crop production ecologically safe. It is important to meet the nutrient requirements of sweet corn during its growth period; the local farmers are keen to apply fertilizer several times to grow sweet corn at a higher yield [20]. It is necessary to evaluate the N fertilizer management methods to meet the crop nutrient requirements and to reduce the soil N loss and labor cost for fertilization in the dry land maize planting system
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