Management of two irrigation systems and Algae Foliar application on wheat plant growth

Abstract

In the light of crop shortage production, water scarcity and environmental pollution. The utilization of biofertilizers as an algae extract and modern irrigation systems has become paramount important to reduce the chemical fertilizers and ensure good distribution for plants. Therefore, two field experiments were conducted in the Nubaria district at the Agricultural Station of the National Research Centre, El-Behira Governorate within the two winter seasons 2015/2016 & 2016/2017 to demonstrate the influence of two irrigation systems, i.e., drip and sprinkler and two rates of algae extract foliar application i.e., 0 g/L and 1.5 g/L on growth parameters and spike characteristics of two wheat varieties i.e., Gemiza-9 and Misr-1 grown in sandy soil. Results indicated that irrigation systems were significant effective on all characters except leaf area, plant height and spike length. On the other hand, all growth parameters and weight of spike of the two wheat varieties showed significantly differences under the studied treatments. The results clarified that some tested characters of Gemiza-9 variety were considerably improved. However, the Misr-1 variety surpassed Gemiza-9 in all characters in both seasons. While the algae foliar extract was significantly effective on all characters of study. The rate of 1.5 g/L of algae extract gave the highest values of all the studied parameters. Respecting to the first and second order interacted of factors under study effect on such parameters; the results showed that there were many parameters that improved significantly. According to the results of this study, it could be concluded that the combined treatments of foliar spray with 1.5 g/L of algae extract and two wheat varieties under two irrigation systems were found to be highly effective in improving wheat growth in sandy soil condition.

Keywords

• irrigation system
• Algae
• Foliar
• wheat varieties
• growth