2024, Vol. 7, Issue 7, Part I

author(s)
Kinjal J Dodiya, AC Detroja, Sachin P Dodiya, Shraddha N. Vegda and Shweta N Vekariya

abstract
A field experiment entitled “Growth and yield of rabi maize (Zea mays L.) influenced by different foliar treatments of urea and nano urea” was carried out under clayey soil having pH 7.9 and EC 0.36 dS/m during rabi season of 2022-23 at Instructional Farm, Department of Agronomy, College of Agriculture, Junagadh Agricultural University, Junagadh (Gujarat). The experiment was laid out in randomized block design with three replications. The experiment comprising of 10 treatments viz., T₁ -Control (No fertilizer), T₂ -100% RDN + Water spray at 25, 35 and 45 DAS, T₃ -75% RDN + Foliar spray of 2% urea at 25 and 45 DAS, T₄ -75% RDN + Foliar spray of 2 ml/L nano urea at 25 and 45 DAS, T₅ -75% RDN + Foliar spray of 4 ml/L nano urea at 25 and 45 DAS, T₆ -75% RDN + Foliar spray of 6 ml/L nano urea at 25 and 45 DAS, T₇ -75% RDN + Foliar spray of 2% urea at 25, 35 and 45 DAS, T₈ -75% RDN + Foliar spray of 2 ml/L nano urea at 25, 35 and 45 DAS, T₉ -75% RDN + Foliar spray of 4 ml/L nano urea at 25, 35 and 45 DAS and T₁₀ -75% RDN + Foliar spray of 6 ml/L nano urea at 25, 35 and 45 DAS. The rabi maize (GAYMH-3) was sown on 23^th November 2022 at a spacing of 60 x 20 cm using seed rate of 25 kg/ha with standard package of practices. The result of field experiment revealed that the application of 75% RDN + Foliar spray of 4 ml/L nano urea at 25, 35 and 45 DAS recorded significantly higher values of growth parameters viz., plant height, number of leaves per plant, SPAD value and dry matter production per plant at harvest; yield attributes and yield viz., number of grains per cob, cob length, 100 grains weight, grain yield (6424 kg/ha) and dry fodder yield (8942 kg/ha), over control. Economic analysis showed that the maximum net return (98373 ₹/ha) and BCR (3.16) were obtained with the application of 75% RDN + Foliar spray of 4 ml/L nano urea at 25, 35 and 45 DAS over control.