Effect of tillage and weed management on growth and yield in maize-redgram cropping system

Abstract

The field experiments were carried out at Annamalai University Experimental Farm, Department of Agronomy, Faculty of Agriculture, Annamalai Nagar, Tamil Nadu, India during the rabi and summer season of 2024 and 2025 to study the effect of tillage and weed management in maize –red gram cropping system. Experiments were conducted using split plot design with four main treatments viz., M1-Zero tillage (ZT) in maize - CT in red gram, M2-CT (Maize) - Zero tillage (ZT) (red gram),M3- ZT (maize) - ZT (red gram) and M4 CT (maize) - CT (red gram) and four sub treatments which includes weed management practices viz. S1- Two hand weeding on 15 and 30 DAS in both maize and red gram, S2- pre emergence application of metolachlor @ 1.25 a.i kg ha -1+ hand weeding on 30 DAS in maize and Pre emergence application of pendimethalin 0.75 kg ha -1+ hand weeding on 30 DAS in maize, S3- Pre emergence application of metolachlor @ 1.25 a.i kg ha-1+post emergence application of halosulfuron methyl + atrazine @ 0.596 a.i kg ha-1 in maize and pre emergence of pendimethalin 0.75 a.i kg ha-1+ post emergence application of quizalopehyl +imazethapyr @ 0.10g ai kg ha-1 in redgram and S4- unweeded control. The result of the present study demonstrates that the higher growth and yield parameters of maize and redgram were influenced by both the tillage and weed management practices. Among the given tillage practices CT-CT (M4) resulted in the maximum values of growth and yield attributes in both the crops. In terms of weed control treatments S2 recorded the increased growth and yield parameters in both the crops which was at par with S3. In case of interactions M4S2 was recorded as best treatment which was on par with M4S3, where as the lowest values were obtained in M3S4 in both the crops.