Ecology, Environment and Conservation Paper

GROWTH, NUTRIENT UPTAKE AND YIELD OF PRE-SEASONAL SUGARCANE AS INFLUENCED BY SALINE SOIL

R.U. Nimbalkar, C.R. Palwe, A.D. Kadlag, A.B. Jadhav and N.B. Ghube

Abstract

A field experiment was conducted at Soil Test Crop Response Correlation Project Farm during preseason of 2006-08 at Department of Soil Science and Agricultural Chemistry, Mahatma Phule Agricultural University, Rahuri to study the Growth, nutrient uptake and yield of preseasonal sugarcane as influenced by saline soil. The experimental soil represent Sawargaon series under Inceptisol order having pHe 8.45 and ECe 4.14 d Sm-1. There were six sugarcane genotypes viz; CO 86032, CO 94012, COM 0265, CO 62175, CO 94008, COM 9516 replicated four times on saline soil with randomized block design. A sugarcane genotype COM 0265 significantly performed well over saline soil with higher germination (83.88%), height (261.25 cm), girth (10.88 cm) and number of internodes at harvest (22.50). The leaves dry matter of all the genotypes were not significantaly varied however numerically CO 62175 recorded higher (24.40%) leaves dry matter. Over saline soil the stem dry matter significantly higher (18.38%) for COM 0265. The sugarcane genotype CO 94012 recorded significantly higher nitrogen (185.99 kg ha-1), phosphorous (34.55 kg ha-1) and potassium (180.05 kg ha-1) uptake grown on saline soil followed by CO 62175. Significantly higher iron (2846.50 g ha-1) and copper (101.75 g ha-1) uptake was recorded for COM 9516 sugarcane genotype, whereas, higher zinc and manganese (509.75 and 113.50 g ha-1) uptake reported for CO 94012. The sugarcane genotype COM 0265 and CO 62175 were recorded statistically at par results for cane (91.10 and 90.70 t ha-1) and CCS (10.09 and 9.63 t ha-1) yield on saline soil respectively.