Rapid industrialization and urbanization have resulted in elevated global temperature over the years consequently disturbing the balance of agro-ecological systems worldwide. Therefore, new eco-friendly agricultural practices for sustainable food production are needed. Mulching could potentially serve the purpose by reducing soil evaporation, conserving moisture, controlling soil temperature, reducing weed growth, and improving microbial activities. Additionally, mulches could provide economical, aesthetic, and environmental advantages to agriculture and landscape. Moreover, in the restoration sites, mulches are widely used for the plantation of trees which need no significant care. Mulches combat with different stress conditions in agricultural lands as well as in landscapes. This review paper focuses on multiple significant impacts of mulches for the production and establishment of different crops in nature. Mulches conserve the soil moisture, enhance the nutrients status of soil, control the erosion losses, suppress the weeds in crop plants, and remove the residual effects of pesticides, fertilizers, and heavy metals. Mulches improve the aesthetic value of landscapes and economic value of crops. This paper also describes some problems associated with various mulch materials. There are contradictions about mulching materials as some researchers favor mulches and others have denoted some concerns. The selection of mulching material is important with respect to crop type, management practices, and climatic conditions. The appropriate mulching technique could provide the aforementioned benefits to the agro-ecological systems. Therefore, the impacts of low-cost, eco-friendly, and biodegradable mulching materials on soil microbes, nutrient balance, plant growth, and soil erosion should be explored in the future.

Compatible solutes rescue plants in the hour of intense water deficit conditions. Glycinebetaine (GB) and potassium (K) are main solutes, playing role in improving plant water potential and ultimately the crop yield. However, only a few attempts have been made so far to study their optimum dozes and interactions to ameliorate the drought stress in wheat. To explore this, GB solutions of 0, 50,100 and 150 mM concentration and K solutions of 0, 0.5, 1.0, and 1.5% concentration were sprayed at milking stage of two wheat varieties under stress (Auqab-2000; drought sensitive and Lasani-2008; drought resistant). The stress was created by withholding water up till appearance of wilting symptoms and then the solutes (alone and/or in combination) were sprayed with carboxymethyl cellulose as a sticking agent, whereas Tween-20 was used as a surfactant for foliar spray. At maturity, ten random plants from field-experiments and three in case of pot experiment were selected to estimate plant height, spike length, number of spikelets spike -1 , number of grains spike -1 , and grain yields. Besides, water potential, osmotic potential and turgor potential of crop were also estimated.The results indicated that the drought stress adversely affected all the above parameters. The exogenous application of GB and K to wheat significantly improved spike length, number of grain per spike and grain yields. Moreover, a significant interaction between these solutes was observed since at a given level of GB all these yield parameters were increased (p < 0.05) with K concentration. The highest values were obtained when GB and K were applied in combination at 100 mM and 1.5%, respectively. The same treatment also improved the leaf water potential, osmotic potential and turgor potential to maintain plant water potential gradient under stress. These findings lead us to conclude that application of GB and K (100 mM and 1.5%, respectively) is the best strategy to ameliorate the drought impact on wheat at milking stage with improved production.

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Drought is ubiquitous in rainfed cropping systems and often limits maize yields. The sensitivity of transpiration response early in progressive soil drying is a trait with potential to improve crop drought resistance. Simulation studies demonstrated that increased sensitivity to drying soil leading to restricted transpiration rates results in conservation of soil water during vegetative stages for possible use during grain filling. In contrast to other crops, there have been no studies characterizing genotypic variability for this trait in maize. Experiments in controlled environments were conducted to characterize the fraction of transpirable soil water (FTSW) threshold on drying soil for 36 hybrids selected for variation in the field for drought resistance, regions of adaptation and stay green. While FTSW thresholds varied among hybrids from 0.60 to 0.33, these thresholds were not uniformly associated with level of drought resistance in the field. Nevertheless, this study demonstrated a high FTSW threshold corresponded with drought resistance observed in some modern maize germplasm (hybrids #7, 17, 24, 27 and 32). This knowledge can enable breeding work seeking to exploit this adaptive trait to improved drought tolerance in low threshold FTSW germplasm.

To increase soybean [Glycine max (L.) Merr.] productivity, it will be necessary to improve yields in water‐deficit regions. Genotype PI 471938, which exhibits a slow‐wilting phenotype under water‐deficit conditions, has proven to be a good genetic resource in developing drought‐resistant progeny even though the physiological basis for this advantage is not known. The objective of this study was to investigate the involvement of four water‐saving, physiological mechanisms as candidates contributing to drought tolerance of PI 471938. (i) In response to soil drying, the soil water content at which leaf gas exchange began to decrease in PI 471938 was not different from the other tested genotypes. (ii) Measurement of leaf photosynthetic capacity failed to show that PI 471938 had a high capacity allowing high CO2 assimilations even with partial stomata closure. (iii) Plant Introduction 471938 failed to exhibit a limited transpiration rate with increasing vapor pressure deficit (VPD), which would have allowed this genotype to conserve soil water during midday periods of high VPD. (iv) Finally, PI 471938 did not show an ability to maintain high leaf water potential (ΨLeaf) when VPD was increasing. In fact, there was a dramatic decrease in ΨLeaf with increasing VPD, which usually implies a decrease in leaf turgor pressure. Overall this study resulted in the rejection of four major hypotheses to explain the slow‐wilting phenotype exhibited by PI 471938, and the basis for its drought resistance remains unknown.

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Silicon nanoparticles (Si-NPs) have shown their potential for use in farming under water-deficient conditions. Thus, the experiment was accomplished to explore the impacts of seed priming of Si-NPs on wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) growth and yield under different drought levels. The plants were grown in pots under natural ecological environmental conditions and were harvested on 25th of April, 2020. The results revealed that seed priming of Si-NPs (0, 300, 600, and 900 mg/L) suggestively improved, the spike length, grains per spike, 1000 grains weight, plant height, grain yield, and biological yield by 12–42%, 14–54%, 5–49%, 5–41%, 17–62%, and 21–64%, respectively, relative to the control. The Si-NPs improved the leaf gas trade ascribes and chlorophyll a and b concentrations, though decreased the oxidative pressure in leaves which was demonstrated by the diminished electrolyte leakage and upgrade in superoxide dismutase and peroxidase activities in leaf under Si-NPs remedies over the control. The outcomes proposed that Si-NPs could improve the yield of wheat under a dry spell. In this manner, the utilization of Si-NPs by seed priming technique is a practical methodology for controlling the drought stress in wheat. These findings will provide the basis for future research and helpful to improve the food security under drought and heat related challenges.

Oilseed rape (Brassica napus L.) is an important oilseed crop worldwide. Drought is the most detrimental environmental factor affecting the crop plants from germination up to maturity. A complete perspective of the effect of drought is crucial in understanding the influence of climate variability on rape cultivation. Water deficit stress affects morphology, physiology and development of rape crop. The aim of this article is to present an outline of the effects of drought stress on the growth, physiological processes, yield and quality parameters of rape crop. When drought stress occurs at critical stages, both short and long term, it can adversely affect important growth and physiological processes like leaf area, root growth, shoot growth, excised leaf water loss (ELWL), relative water content (RWC), photosynthesis and water use efficiency (WUE) by disturbing stomatal adjustment, producing reactive oxygen species (ROS), lowering stomatal conductance and destroying the chlorophyll and other pigments. Rape is more susceptible to water deficit stress during reproductive stages which ultimately affect the yield and oil quality. Some important management strategies for drought mitigation in rape, including use of compatible solutes, nutrients, plant growth regulators, different planting methods are also mentioned and discussed in this review paper.