Effects of Irrigation Regimes and Duration of Weed Interference on Grain Yield of Wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) in Middle Egypt

Abstract

Two experiments were performed at Faculty of Agriculture, El-Minia University Egypt, during two consecutive seasons 2017-18 and 2018-19 to evaluate the impact of weed removal period and different irrigation regimes on weeds, critical period of weed competition and yield of wheat crop and its components. A strip-plot design with three replications was used. Four irrigation regimes were in the horizontal plots and 8 treatments of weed competition (4 weed-free periods and 4 weed competition periods) were in vertical plots. Results showed that omitting 2 irrigation (IR4) significantly decreased total density and dry weight of weeds, wheat traits plant height, spike length, No. of grains spike-1, 1000-grain weight, No. of spikes m-2, grain yield and grain ability. Weed infestation for whole season significantly decreased all studied traits compared with weed removal even once after wheat sowing (DAS). Maximum yield losses of wheat due to weed infestation in whole season were 26.04 and 25.62% compared with weed-free treatment in the 1st and 2nd seasons, respectively. Cubic model was the best model for weed-free and weed competition over all treatments of the two seasons. The critical periods for weed control were 42 and 32 to 62 and 52 DAS in the two seasons.