Optimizing fertilizer schedules for irrigated chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.) under scarce rainfall zone of Andhra Pradesh

Abstract

Conventionally chickpea is cultivated as rainfed crop but under irrigated conditions the optimum dose of fertilizers was not known and the research was also limited. The purpose of this study was to study the optimum dose of fertilizers for chickpea under irrigated conditions. A field experiment was conducted to study the growth and yield of chickpea under varied levels of fertilizer application on sandy loam soils at Agricultural College, Mahanandi during rabi 2021-22. The experimental field was laid out in a randomized block design with 10 treatments and replicated thrice. Nitrogen and phosphorus were applied through urea and single super phosphate, respectively, to all the plots. The results revealed that significantly higher and comparable values of plant height (44.0 cm), number of branches/plant (28.7), number of pods/plant (63.4), 100-seed weight (32.4 g), seed yield (1346.1 kg/ha), gross returns (71344.7 Rs./ha), net returns (43187.7 Rs./ha) and B : C ratio (2.5) were registered with treatment 20 kg N basal+20 kg N split+60 kg P2O5 basal (T9) and higher dry matter accumulation (7168.5 kg/ha) and haulm yield (1352.0 kg/ha) with 20 kg N basal+20 kg N split+70 kg P2O5 basal (T10). Number of seeds/pod and harvest index were not significantly affected by levels of fertilizer application.