Genomics and Applied Biology 2016, Vol.7, No.1, 1-9
1
Research Article Open Access
Delayed Transplanting of Aged Rice Seedlings Causes the Yield Reduction in
Farmer's Field
Kushwaha U.K.S.
, Khatiwada S.P., Upreti H.K.
Agriculture Botany Division, Nepal Agricultural Research Council, Khumaltar, Lalitpur, Nepal
Corresponding author email
Genomics and Applied Biology, 2016, Vol.7, No.1 doi
Received: 12 Jun., 2016
Accepted: 24 Jul., 2016
Published: 07 Sep., 2016
Copyright
© 2016 Kushwaha et al., This is an open access article published under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits
unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Preferred citation for this article
:
Kushwaha U.K.S., Khatiwada S.P., and Upreti H.K., 2016, Delayed transplanting of aged rice seedlings causes the yield reduction in farmer's field,
Genomics and Applied Biology, 7(1): 1-9 (doi
Abstract
Four year experiments were conducted to find out the causes of yield reduction of farmer’s field of Nepal from 2011 to
2014. Randomised complete block design with three replications were used to compare twelve rice genotypes with Khumal-4 as a
standard check. One set of genotypes were transplanted in the last week of June and the other set was transplanted two weeks delayed
as summer season rice. Results showed that rice different parameters like grain yield, plant height, panicle length, days to heading
and days to maturity were found significant (p<0.05). Plant height, panicle length and fertile grain per plant were also found
significant in early transplanted rice than delayed transplanted rice. Delayed transplanted aged rice seedlings took shorter days to
flower and mature than early transplanted rice. On an average, 38.44% decrease in yield was found from early to delayed
transplanted rice from 2011 to 2014. Similarly, grain yield of early transplanted rice was found higher than delayed transplanted rice
in all the year. The reason could be that too early and too late transplanting could not fulfill the required temperature and photoperiod
for rice crop. Late transplant of aged rice seedlings are severe to cold and effect plant growth and yield. Thus the yield reduction of
farmer’s field can be minimised by transplanting rice in appropriate time with recommended package of practices.
Keywords
Delayed transplanting; Aged seedlings; Yield reduction; Potential yield; Farmer’s field
1 Introduction
Quality seeds, irrigation and fertilizers are prerequisite materials for harvesting higher productivity from a crop.
Though farmer’s supply quality seeds, fertilizers and irrigation in time and grow rice in well managed way, they
found difficulty to get its potential yield in countries like Nepal. Agricultural scientists and policy makers have
also reported the yield reduction in farmer’s field which might be due to farmer’s poor field management, less use
of fertilizers, lack of high yielding fertilizer responsive variety, unavailability of irrigation facility in time and lack
of trained farmers (NARC, 1997). Earlier scientists have reported that late transplanting cause yield reduction and
reduce total biomass of the crop (Santhi et al, 1998).
Yield is the end result of interaction between genetic constitutions of a plant and environment under which it
grows. Among environmental factors, climate plays an important role in getting high yield. The highest yield can
be harvested with earliest planting (Kumar, 2001). Nielsen and Thomison (2003) also reported that delayed
planting of corns shortens the available growing seasons. The reason could be that too early and too late
transplanting could not fulfill the required temperature and photoperiod for rice crop. Late transplant are severe to
cold and effect plant growth and yield (Bashir et al, 2010). Akram et al. (2007) reported that yield and yield
parameters like number of tillers, grains per panicle, plant height, 1000 grain weight and sterility of different rice
varieties were significantly affected by transplanting dates. Similarly, Gangwar and Sharma (1997) also observed
more number of panicles in early transplanting than in late transplanting. This was due to the fact that rice
genotypes planted earlier had longer period for their vegetative growth compared to those sown later. But Nazir
(1994) reported that earlier transplanting in rice causes lower number of grains per panicle due to grain sterility
because of high temperature at the time of grain maturation. Transplanting at its optimum time reduces grain
sterility. The overall results of the present investigations lead us to the conclusion that there is a significant effect
of transplanting dates on the yield, yield components and days taken to 100% flowering of rice genotypes even
