The productivity of sole and intercropped maize with groundnut using three rates of poultry manure in Owerri, Imo State
Date
2020-03
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Federal University of Technology, Owerri
Abstract
The experiment was carried out in the farm of School of Agriculture and Agricultural Technology, of Federal University of Technology Teaching andResearch Farm Owerri, during the 2017 cropping season to determine the productivity of sole and intercropped maize with groundnut using 3x 3factorial fitted into a Randomized Complete Block Designed replicated three times. The treatments consisted of three rates of poultry manure at 0, 5 and 10 tons/Ha and three cropping systems namely; sole maize, sole groundnut, and maize/groundnut intercrop. The biological efficiency of the intercropping system was evaluated using the land equivalent ratio and the relative yield totals respectively. Data on various crop growth and yield parameters for maize and groundnut were measured and subjected to analysis of variance while mean separation was done using the least significant differences at 5 level of probability. Results indicated that the 10 tons/ha poultry manure rate gave the highest maize fresh cob yield of 4.68tons/ha compared with 1.83tons/ha when no manure was added. Also groundnut grain yield of 2.83tons/ha was highest when 10 ton/ha of poultry manure was applied compared with 1.02 tons/ha when no manure was applied. The result from the post-harvest soil analysis showed that substantial amount of magnesium increased which indicates that in the pre-planting chemical and physical analysis 0.16 of Magnesium was available, then in the post soil chemical and physical analysis is observed to have increased to 0.67. Then calcium in the preplanting soil physical and chemical analysis was 0.40 later increased to 1.5 in the post-harvest soil chemical and physical analysis. Then nitrogen in the preplanting soil physical and chemical analysis was 0.15 and in the post-harvest soil chemical and physical analysis it was 0.14 which means not all the nitrogen was used up. Based on the results of this experiment I strongly recommend the application of 10 tons/ha of poultry manure to boost the productivity of maize/groundnut yields in mixture.
Description
This thesis is for the award of Master of Science (M.Sc) in Agricultural Technology (Agronomy)
Keywords
Intercropping, productivity, poultry manure, maize, groundnut, land equivalent ratio and relative yield, Department of Crop Science and Technology
Citation
Uzoigwe, C. P. (2020). The productivity of sole and intercropped maize with groundnut using three rates of poultry manure in Owerri, Imo State [Unpublished Master's Thesis]. Federal University of Technology, Owerri, Nigeria