GROWTH AND YIELD PERFORMANCE OF SOME HIGH YIELDING WHEAT VARIETIES AS AFFECTED BY IRRIGATION LEVEL

Abstract

The experiment was carried out to evaluate growth and yield performance of some high yielding wheat varieties as affected by irrigation level at the Research Field and Laboratory of Crop Physiology and Ecology Department, Hajee Mohammad Danesh Science and Technology University, Dinajpur during the period of November, 2010 to April, 2011. The experimental treatments were three modern wheat varieties released by BARI (BARI gam26, Prodip and Kanchan) and four levels of irrigation (No irrigation, 45 mm irrigation in total life span, 90 mm irrigation in total life span and 135 mm irrigation in total life span). The experiment was laid out in a Randomized Complete Block Design (RCBD) with three replications. From the study it was observed that to attain most of phenological stages of wheat required maximum days in BARI gam-26. The duration of seedling emergence required the lowest days while tillering, booting, heading and maturity required the highest days for BARI gam-26. Present study also revealed that differences in variety influenced significantly on TDM, LAI, LAD, CGR, RGR and NAR. Irrigation frequency also influenced the above growth parameters. The results also revealed that BARI gam-26 with IR3 irrigation gave the highest values of all the growth parameters. Relative leaf water content (RLWC) was significantly influenced due to variation in variety. BARI gam-26 gave the highest values of RLWC content. Irrigation frequency also significantly influenced the RLWC content. Significantly higher plant height (107 cm), fertile tillers per plant (5.08), spike length (18.18 cm), fertile spikelets per spike (45.19), 1000-grain weight (43.23g), yield (3.76 t/ha) and HI (26.50%) was found in the wheat cv. BARI gam-26 and the lowest yield (3.42 t/ha) was obtained in the variety Kanchan. The irrigation levels also significantly influenced yield and yield attributes. The highest plant height (112.97 cm), fertile tillers per plant (5.15), spike length (18.01 cm), fertile spikelets per spike (46.10), 1000-grain weight (43.19g), yield (4.30 t/ha) and HI (29.78%) was obtain from the plant growing with IR3 (135 mm irrigation in total life cycle) while the lowest plant height(93.84), fertile tiller(3.34), spike length(16.56 cm), fertile spikelets per spike (36.30), 1000-grain weight (38.69g), yield (2.41 t/ha) and HI (22.49%) was found from no irrigation. However, infertile tillers per plant and infertile spikelets per spike showed a reverse result in case of irrigation level. The interaction between variety and irrigation frequency showed a significant variation among the growth, yield (4.69 t/ha) and yield attributes of wheat. It is indicated that BARI gam-26 with IR3 showed the best performance in respect of growth, yield attributes and yield of wheat.