Effect of sowing time on growth, yield and phenology of wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) genotypes in North-Western plain zone

Abstract

The field experiment was conducted at CRC Farm Chirrori, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel Agriculture University Meerut during rabi 2012-13 and 2013-14. The experiment comprised of three sowing time i.e. I week of December, III week of December and I week of January with four wheat genotypes viz. Raj 3765, PBW 590, DBW 16 and WH 1021. The experiment was laid out in split-plot design, replicated with three times. The result expressed that Sowing of wheat on I week of December noticed significantly higher effective tillers, higher dry matter accumulation, higher leaf area index and crop growth rate than other sowing time. Significant reduction was recorded between the times of sowing and genotypes. The yield and yield attributes in terms of spikelet’s spike-1, spike length (cm), 1000-grain weight (g), harvest index (%), biological yield and grain yield (q ha-1) recorded marked reduction under delayed sowing. Moreover, in overall among the genotypes, PBW 590 was found to be best performance followed by WH 1021 at December I week sowing as compared to all other sowing dates.