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| Effect of Soil Applied Humic Acid and Foliar Applied Zinc on the Growth and Yield of Wheat |
Shahabuddin Soomro, Abdul Ghaffar Khoso, Farrukh Asghar, Enayat Aziz, Mansab Khan, Ameer Uddin, Khalil Asghar
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Abstract:
A field study was carried out on the effect of soil-applied Humic acid and Foliar applied zinc on the growth and yield of wheat (variety SKD-1) at the experimental fields of Agriculture Chemistry (Soils) Section, Agriculture Research Institute, Tando Jam during 2013-2014. Observations on Plant height (cm), Tillers plant-1, Spike length (cm), Grains spike-1, Grain weight plant-1 (g), Seed index (1000 grains weight, g), Biological yield (kg ha-1) and Grain yield (kg-1) were recorded. The results revealed significant (P<0.05) effect of various levels of soil applied humic acid and foliar application of zinc on all the growth and grain yield traits of wheat. The crop supplied with a higher humic acid level of 8.00 kg-1 resulted in 97.69 cm plant height, 5.82 tillers plant-1, 11.11 cm spike length, 40.00 grains spike-1, 24.81 g grain weight plant-1, 38.40 g seed index, 9860.30 kg biological yield ha-1 and 4838.80 kg grain yield ha-1. The decrease in humic acid upto 6.00 kg ha-1resulted in 95.57 cm plant height, 5.69 tillers plant-1, 10.87 cm spike length, 39.25 grains spike-1, 24.34 g grain weight plant-1, 37.68 g seed index, 9652.70 kg biological yield ha-1 and 4747.80 kg grain yield ha-1. The crop under control (no humic acid application) resulted in the lowest values for all the traits studied. The effect of foliar applied zinc indicated that the crop sprayed with Zn at higher concentration of 0.4% resulted in 97.29 cm plant height, 5.79 tillers plant-1, 11.06 cm spike length, 39.81 grains spike-1, 24.69 g grain weight plant-1, 38.22 g seed index, 9820.00 kg biological yield ha-1 and 4815.70 kg grain yield ha-1. The crop sprayed with Zn at a lower concentration of 0.2% and control Zn, resulted in lower values for all the growth and yield traits. It was concluded that the differences in the grain weight plant-1 and grain yield ha-1 between the soil applied humic acid level of 6.00 kg and 8.00 kg ha-1 were non-significant, suggesting that 6.00 kg ha-1 humic acid would be optimum for wheat variety SKD-1. On the other hand, the values for grain yield and its contributing traits under higher foliar applied Zn concentration (0.3%) were markedly higher than the crop performance under lower Zn concentration and control. Hence, it is suggestible that for achieving economically higher grain yield in wheat variety SKD-1, the crop may be supplied with 6.00 kg ha-1 humic acid through the soil, and foliar application of Zn at 0.3% concentration may be ensured in addition to the recommended dose of NPK fertilizers
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