Wheat management with different tillage practices under rice-wheat cropping system

Abstract

Timely sowing of wheat is one of the major problems under rice-wheat cropping system in Indo-Gangetic plains of India. Traditionally farmers used to burn the rice straw to facilitate seed bed preparation for wheat. Decline in soil organic matter and crop productivity in rice-wheat cropping system has become a major concern to the researcher. At the same time farmers are now interested to use a machinery to facilitate the timely sowing of wheat crop and rice straw management. The soil tillage system may affect the incorporation of crop residue and influence the nutrient dynamics. Considering the above, a field experiment was conducted for four consecutive years at the Crop Research Center of G. B. Pant University of Agriculture and Technology, Pantnagar (India) to evaluate the effect of different tillage practices on soil health and crop productivity of wheat (var. PBW-343) under rice-wheat cropping system. Five different tillage practices, namely conventional tillage (CT), Conservational tillage I (CMB), Conservational tillage II (CSD), Zero till sowing (ZT) and strip till sowing (ST) were followed for experimentation. Mean data of four years showed that the CSD produced significantly higher number of ear bearing shoots over ZT, but there was no any significant increase in grain yield. The grain weight per spike and test weight were lower in CSD and ZT than other tillage practices.