Growth and yield enhancement of rabi maize through identification of best timing for herbicide application

Abstract

Maize (Zea mays L.) as a highly productive crop mostly influenced by weeds, that can reduce the yield about 25 to 90 % which is much more than the other losses. In this contests to assess the best weed management practice this experiment entitled “effect of application timing of chemical herbicides on weed control efficacy and productivity of rabi maize (Zea mays L.)” was conducted during rabi season of 2017-18 at Research farm of BAU, Bhagalpur. The experiment was laid out in split plot design with three replications having 18 treatment combinations consisted of three as pre emergence (main plot) and six as post emergence (sub plot). The application of atrazine 1000 g a.i. ha-1 (PE) fb tembotrione 120 g a.i. ha-1 + atrazine 500 g a.i. ha-1 (PoE) significantly increases the LAI, dry weight, number of cobs plant-1, cob length, cob weight, number of grains cob-1 and grain yield of maize. So it may conclude that the that application of atrazine 1000 g a.i. ha-1 as PE fb tembotrione 120 g a.i. ha-1 + atrazine 500 g a.i. ha-1 as PoE may enhance the growth and yield by effective weed control which can increase the benefits of farmers growing rabi maize.