Abstract
Potassium (K) fertilizer management is beneficial for improving growth, yield and yield components of field crops under moisture stress condition in semiarid climates. Field experiments were conducted to study the response of maize (Zea mays L., cv. Azam) to foliar and soil applied K during summer 2013 and 2014. The experiments were carried out at the Agronomy Research Farm of The University of Agriculture Peshawar, Northwest Pakistan under limited irrigation (moisture stress) condition. It was concluded from the results that application of foliar K at the rate of 1–3% and foliar Zn at the rate of 0.1–0.2% was more beneficial in terms of better growth, higher yield and yield components of maize under moisture stress condition. Early spray (vegetative stage) resulted in better growth and higher yield than late spray (reproductive stage). Soil K treated plots (rest) plots performed better than control (K not applied) in terms of improved growth, higher yield and yield components of maize crop. The results further demonstrated that increasing the rate of soil applied K up to 90 kg P ha−1 in two equal splits (50% each at sowing and knee height) improve growth and maize productivity under semiarid climates.
Highlights
The growers in the drylands do not apply potassium (K) fertilizers and the crops suffer from drought stress and suffer from K deficiency
In 2013, number of grains ear−1 increased with 0.2% and minimum with 0.1% foliar Zn, while in 2014, maximum grains ear−1 was obtained with 0.2% Zn and minimum with 0.3% foliar Zn38 reported that Zn application increased the number of grains ear−1 in maize
It was concluded from experiment one that foliar K application improve growth, increased yield and yield components of dryland maize under semiarid climates
Summary
The growers in the drylands do not apply potassium (K) fertilizers and the crops suffer from drought stress and suffer from K deficiency. Foliar K application is an attractive means especially in arid zones where a lack of water under low rainfall conditions in summer drastically depresses absorption of soil nutrients[25,26] reported that foliar application of K at grain filling stage of wheat alleviated the adverse effect of water deficit and increased the yield and yield components tremendously. This objectives of this research projects were: (1) to find out suitable soil applied K level and its application time and (2) to find out suitable foliar applied K level and its application time for increasing maize productivity under limited irrigation (moisture stress) condition
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