Response of Crop Establishment Methods and Weed Management Practices on Weed Flora, Crop Growth and Yield of Wheat in Maize-Wheat-Greengram Cropping System

Sustainable agriculture mostly relies on conservation tillage, crop residue retention and crop diversification. Weeds are major production hurdles in adoption of conservation agriculture (CA), therefore, weed management is important for sustainable crop yield. Designing efficient integrated weed management (IWM) practices under zero-tillage with crop residue (ZT+R) is helpful in getting optimum yield. A field experiment was carried out at research farm of ICAR-Directorate of Weed Research, Jabalpur (M.P.), India with eight treatment combinations, two crop establishment methods (conventional tillage and conservation tillage) in main plots and four weed management practices (weedy check, recommended herbicide, IWM, and herbicide rotation) in sub-plots were evaluated using a split plot design with three replications. The results indicated that the wheat sown under ZT+R led to significantly less weed density (105.9 no. m-2 in 2020-21 and 122.8 no. m-2 in 2022-23) and biomass (149.7 and 174.2 g m-2, respectively) hence, registered the highest weed control efficiency (WCE, 72.3% and 71.2%, respectively). Higher WCE helped in producing better wheat growth indices like plant height (106.3 and 101.1 cm, respectively), biomass (12.0 and 9.0 g plant-1, respectively) and no. of tillers (488.0 and 391.3 no. m-2, respectively) ultimately grain yield (4164 and 3814 kg ha-1, respectively) and straw yield (7265 and 6834 kg ha-1, respectively) compared with conventional tillage during both the years. Among the weed management practices, ready-mix application of clodinafop + metsulfuron at 60+4 g ha-1 (30-35 days after sowing, DAS) followed by (fb) hand weeding at 45 DAS increased growth indices like plant height (110.2 and 105.0 cm, respectively), plant biomass (14.9 and 12.1 g plant-1, respectively) and no. of tillers (547.2 and 436.7 no. m-2, respectively) ultimately grain yield (4708 and 4299 kg ha-1, respectively) and straw yield (7836 and 7610 kg ha-1, respectively), and WCE (97.4% and 96.8% respectively) with significantly less weed density (25.7 and 35.0 no. m-2, respectively) and biomass (13.6 and 19.9 g m-2, respectively) at 90 days after sowing. IWM also completely reduces the weed density and biomass over the other weed management practices during both the years. Therefore, wheat sown under ZT+R coupled with IWM was superior in terms of weed control, crop growth and yields.

Influence of Irrigation Scheduling on Weeds among Different Sowing Dates in Wheat under Vertisol

Wheat is an important cereal grain crop and is staple to millions. Weeds are the major constraint that lower the wheat yield. The knowledge of weeds under different sowing dates and Irrigation can assist in controlling weeds. A field experiment was conducted during the rabi season of 2020-21 at Jawaharlal Nehru Krishi Vishwa Vidyalaya, Jabalpur, M.P. to study the influence of irrigation scheduling on weeds at different sowing dates in wheat. The experiment was laid out in split-plot design with three replications. The main plot consisted of three sowing dates, i.e., 3rd December, 18th December and 2nd January and four Irrigation Water/Cumulative Pan Evaporation (IW/CPE) based irrigation scheduling, 1.0, 0.9, 0.8 and 0.7 in the sub-plots. The results revealed that lowest weed density and dry weight were observed in 2nd January sown date, as compared to 3rd December and 18th December sown date. Among the irrigation schedules, 0.7 IW/CPE observed lowest weed density and dry weight than 1.0, 0.9, 0.8 IW/CPE ratio. 3rd December sown date exhibited highest grain yield (4637 kg ha-1) and straw yield (6788 kg ha-1) than 18th December and 2nd January sown date. Among the irrigation schedules, 1.0 IW/CPE ratio exhibited maximum grain yield (4510 kg ha-1) than 0.9, 0.8 and 0.7 IW/CPE ratio. The results of the study concludes that sowing dates and irrigation schedules had crucial role for controlling weeds.

Potential of Microbispora sp. V2 as biocontrol agent against Sclerotium rolfsii, the causative agent of southern blight of Zea mays L (Baby corn)–in vitro studies.

The study was undertaken with the aim of exploring novel and beneficial agro activities of rare actinomycetes like Microbispora sp. V2. The antagonistic activity of Microbispora sp. V2 was evaluated as a biocontrol agents against Sclerotium rolfsii, a soil-borne fungal plant pathogen. The methodology performed for evaluation of biocontrol agent was in vitro evaluation assay which comprised of three tests viz., cellophane overlay technique, seed germination test and Thiram (fungicide) tolerance of Microbispora sp. V2. The isolate was found to inhibit the fungal pathogen Sclerotium rolfsii to 91.43% in cellophane assay. In seed germination assay, Microbispora sp. V2 treated seeds resulted in 25.75% increased germination efficiency, as compared to seeds infected by Sclerotium rolfsii. The isolate Microbispora sp. V2 could tolerate 1000 µg mL-1 of Thiram (fungicide). The in vitro assay studies proved that Microbispora sp. V2 can be used as antifungal antagonist and thus posses’ great potential as biocontrol agent against southern blight caused by Sclerotium rolfsii in Zea mays L (Baby corn) which causes large economical losses.