Phenology, Crop Stand and Biomass of Wheat in Response to Farmyard Manure and Soil Amendments

Abstract

W heat (Triticum aestivum L.) belonging to family Poaceae and utilized for food and feed purpose. Pakistan occupies 8 th position in wheat production (Muhammad et al., 2013). It is cultivated over 42% of total cultivable land in Pakistan with average production of 2919 kg ha -1 (MNFSR, 2018). The average yield of wheat in Pakistan is not satisfactory for the food demands of increasing population. Pakistani nation prefer wheat over the grains crops like rice, maize, barley etc. (Muhammad et al., 2013). This low wheat productivity is being associated with low soil fertility and imbalance use of nutrients.Frequent and continuous supply of nutrients results in improving the yield and yield parameters (Muhammad et al., 2013). Wheat needs huge amount of nutrients including nitrogen, and thus depleting Abstract | The stimulated decomposition of farmyard manure (FYM) through soil amendments is considered to improve the nitrogen (N) availability and hence the crop biomass. With this view, the four soil amendments [i.e. No-amendments, Min-N (30 kg N ha -1 ), humic acid (2.5 kg ha -1 ) and effective microbes (200 L Mg -1 of FYM)] were added to five levels of FYM (i.e. 0, 5, 10, 15 and 20 Mg ha -1 ) and their impact were quantified in terms of wheat phenology, crop stand and biomass during two years studies (2016-17 and 2017-18). Min-N was provided from urea, humic acid from "humic plus" a commercial product having 40% humic acid, and effective microbes from "bioaab" a commercial product having beneficial microbes like bacteria, yeast and actinomycetes. Average over years, the maximum days to anthesis (126 days), physiological maturity (154 days) and enhanced emergence (9 days) were observed with 20 Mg FYM ha -1 . The emergence m -2 (126), leaf area tiller -1 (107 cm 2 ), plant height (96.5 cm) and biomass (11783 kg ha -1 ) were improved with 20 Mg FYM but were non-significantly different from plots having 15 Mg FYM ha -1 over two years averaged data. Among the amendments, greater days to anthesis (126 days) and physiological maturity (154 days) was noted with effective microbes over two years. Similarly, the addition of effective microbes has increased the emergence m -2 (123), leaf area tiller -1 (105.6 cm 2 ), plant height (96.6 cm) and biomass (11386 kg ha -1 ). The physiological maturity delayed when FYM increased from 0 to 20 Mg ha -1 and applied with effective microbes. However, using >10 Mg FYM ha -1 has no differences in emergence m -2 across the amendments. In conclusion, the addition of effective microbes can enhance crop stand and biomass when added with 15-20 Mg FYM ha -1 .

Phenology, Crop Stand, and Dry Matter Production of Wheat in Response to Beneficial Microbes and Organic Matter Sources

“…Greater mineralization with higher levels of EM might be the possible reason for delayed booting and anthesis (Khan et al, 2019). These findings agreed with Anjum and Khan (2020), who reported delayed phenology by adding EM compared with other amendments.…”

“…Delayed booting, anthesis, and maturity came about with the addition of PM compared with other sources during both years. Better mineralization with PM over other sources might enhance nutrient availability, especially nitrogen (Rasul et al, 2015;Adnan et al, 2022), which might result in vigorous growth (Anjum and Khan, 2020). Nitrogen, as the structural and functional component of a plant's cell, might improve the chlorophyll contents and vegetative plant vegetative, hence delaying the phenology.…”