Relay planting of wheat in cotton

G.S.Buttar Head, Department of Agronomy Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana

In South Asia, cotton-wheat rotation is being followed on approximately 4.5 M ha area. In Punjab cotton crop is grown on more than 5.25 lakh hectare area and on more than 90 per cent area late sown wheat crop is grown after cotton . The productivity of wheat sown after cotton is generally low (0.5-1.0 t ha-1) as compared to wheat sown after paddy (4.55.0 t ha-1). All the inputs used for wheat crop are same wether grown after paddy or wheat. This reduction in yield is mainly due to delayed sowing of wheat after late picking of cotton.

Wheat productivity in different districts of Punjab (kg/ha)

District Ludhiana Sangrur Patiala Bathinda Mansa Ferozepur Faridkot 2009-10 4634 4538 4523 4034 4297 4142 4107

Objectives of relay planting of wheat in standing cotton

To evaluate suitable machinery for relay cropping of wheat into standing cotton crop To find out the optimum method of planting wheat in standing cotton crop

various methods
Self propelled Relay seeder Hand drill Broadcasting Conventional method

Newly Developed Prototype

Clutches

Seed box

Fertilizer box

Engine Separator

Relay Seeder Specifications

Machine length Width Height Number of tynes Tyne to tyne distance Engine Engine RPM Engine Model Number of tyres Tyre thickness 210 cm 65 cm 130 cm 3 18 cm 7.2 HP 3222 Greaves model 1080 2 10 cm

Relay Seeding of Wheat In Standing Cotton during 20102011

Variety S.No. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Village Gehri Butter Jodhpur Romana Jodhpur Romana Gehri Butter Jodhpur Romana Gehri Butter Jodhpur Romana Gehri Butter Jodhpur Romana Bathinda Lat., 30.11608 N 30.15721 N 30.13931 N 30.09837 N 30.14428 N 30.11071 N 30.15897 N 30.10112 N 30.14533 N 30.18811 N Long. DBW 17 074.88899 E DBW 17 074.93042 E DBW 17 074.92664 E DBW 17 074.87917 E DBW 17 074.91803 E DBW 17 074.88699 E DBW 17 074.92627 E DBW 17 074.88165 E DBW 17 074.91614 E 074.95247 E DBW 17 26-11-2010 16-12-2010 20 19-11-2010 02-12-2010 13 18-11-2010 07-12-2010 19 17-11-2010 17-12-2010 30 16-11-2010 14-12-2010 28 14-11-2010 07-12-2010 23 19-11-2010 15-12-2010 26 12-11-2010 19-12-2010 37 11-11-2010 19-12-2010 38 10-11-2010 21-12-2010 DO RC DOS (FP) Advance Sowing (days) 41

Wheat seeding in standing cotton

MOV00839.MPG

Relay Wheat

Farmer Practice

Farmer Practice

Relay wheat

Removal cotton sticks Relay wheat in standing cotton

Wheat crop after 30 days

Manual pulling of cotton sticks after 30 days

Comparison of Relay & Conventional Crop

Sowing on

06-12-09

11-11-09

Crop duration (days) under relay cropping vis-a vis conventional planting of wheat
Treatment Relay cropping with relay seeder Relay cropping manually Relay seeding by broadcasting Conventional 2009-10 151.5 151.5 151.5 119.8 2010-11 150.8 150.8 150.8 123.3 Mean 151.1 151.1 151.1 121.5

Yield attributing characters of wheat under different planting methods

Treatment Plant ht (cm) 71.8 70.7 67.0 69.0 Tiller density (m2) 523 492 470 465 Spike length (cm) 9.43 9.08 8.60 8.55 Number Test wt of grains (g) / spike 48.7 48.6 38.6 37.8 40.4 40.3 39.2 37.1

Relay cropping with relay seeder Relay cropping manually Relay seeding by broadcasting Conventional

Yield Comparison of Relay Seeding of wheat in standing cotton

Net profit B:C Treatment Wheat grain yield ( t ha-1) Cost of -1 s 2009-10 2010-11 Mean cultivation (US$ ha ) ratio (US$ ha-1)

T1 Relay seeding 4.97a 4.84a 4.91a 430 3.15 1353a T2 Hand drill 4.51a 4.51a 430 2.61 1123b T3 Broadcasting 4.39a 4.64a 4.52a 430 2.61 1124b T4 Conventional 3.52b 4.33b 3.93b 463 2.11 978c Within a column, means followed by the same letter are not significantly different at the 0.05 level of probability by the Duncans multiple range test (DMRT)

CIMMYT and PAU officials visiting the experimental field after 50 days

High clearance platform for 4-wheel tractor

Conclusions
Relay cropping of wheat in standing cotton crop can help in getting 1.0-1.3 t/ha higher grain yield of wheat by advancing the sowing time by 19-40 days as compared to conventional method. New machinery and package of practices needs to be developed for wide spread adoption of this technology.

Thanks