Nutrient management as influenced by tillage and crop residues on yield of maize (Zea mays L.)

Abstract

Global food security, global environmental preservation as well as farmer level increased livelihood should be the main goals of a sustainable farming system in today’s world plagued by degraded soils as a result of unsustainable crop management practices. Current agricultural management systems are threatened by increasing competition for ever-scarce water resources combined with continued use by most farmers of highly inefficient irrigation systems. The objective of this study was develop suitable tillage, crop residues and nutrient management practice in maize. Maize crop was raised in a split plot design with tillage as main and nutrient management as a sub treatments. Tillage treatments included Conventional tillage (CT), Zero tillage (ZT) and zero tillage with mulch (ZTM). Nutrient management treatments viz: nutrients required for a targeted yield of 8 and 10 ton per ha, state recommendation (SR), farmers practice (FP) and treatments where N, P and K omitted. Among the tillage practices, ZT recorded a highest grain (9.32 t ha-1) and straw yield (11.73 t ha-1) but ZTM maintained better physical, chemical and biological properties compared to other tillage practices. In case of nutrient management practices targeted yield 10 ton per ha which recorded highest grain yield of 11.01 t ha-1 validated the target based application concept ,Omitting potassium (10.32 t ha-1) and targeted yield 8 ton per ha (9.90 t ha-1) closely following it. In this study nutrient management strategy increased crop yield and profitability compared with treatments based on existing recommendation and farm practices with different tillage practices.