Effect of different crop establishment methods on soil physical, chemical and biological properties in rice-rice cropping sequence

Abstract

To study the effect of different crop establishment methods of rice on soil physical, chemical and biological properties, the field experiments were conducted in Kharif 2016 and Rabi 2016-17 seasons at Tamil Nadu Rice Research Institute, Aduthurai. The study consisted of six treatments viz., T1– Non- puddled transplanted rice (NPTR) in kharif – No Till (NT) in rabi, T2 – NPTR in kharif – Puddled transplanted rice (PTR) in rabi, T3 – Dry Seeded Rice (DSR) in kharif – NT in rabi, T4 – DSR in kharif – PTR in rabi, T5 – PTR in kharif– NT in rabi and T6 – PTR in both kharif and rabi. The results revealed that there is no significant difference between crop establishment methods on soil physical properties like soil bulk density, particle density, porosity and infiltration rate during both kharif 2016 and rabi 2016-17 season. However there is Significant different observed between crop establishment methods on soil chemical and biological properties. The soil available nutrients were lower in DSR followed by PTR during kharif 2016 and DSR-PTR during rabi 2016-17. The microbial population of the beneficial organisms namely Azotobacter, Azospirillum and PSB were observed to be higher in DSR during kharif2016andDSR-PTRduringrabi 2016-17. Therefore the higher grain yield was obtained under DSR in kharif2016 and DSR- PTR in rabi2016-17 season.