Evaluation of crop sequences under natural farming organic and integrated nutrient management production systems

Abstract

A field experiment entitled Evaluation of crop sequences under natural farming, newlineorganic and integrated nutrient management production systems was conducted newlineduring Kharif 2019-20 to Rabi 2020-21 at the Research Farm of Agronomy newlineDepartment, College of Agriculture, CSK HPKV, Palampur to explore the production newlinepotential of identified cropping sequences and to monitor the change in soil fertility, newlinequality and economic viability of the crop sequences. The soil at the experimental site newlinewas silty clay loam with an acidic reaction, medium organic carbon content, available newlinephosphorus and potassium and low available nitrogen. The experiment consisted with newlinesixteen treatments and three replications were laid out in split plot design. The newlinetreatments consisted of four production system viz. integrated nutrient management, newlineorganic farming, natural farming, conservation agriculture in main plots and in sub newlineplots, maize - wheat, maize + cowpea - wheat + gram, maize + soybean-radish-onion newlineand okra + pole bean - cabbage + garden pea were undertaken. In different cropping newlinesequences, okra + pole bean cabbage + pea sequence in combination with integrated newlinenutrient management came out to be best in terms of maize grain equivalent yield newline(33009 kg ha-1 newline) followed by organic farming system. However, integrated nutrient newlinemanagement in okra + pole bean cabbage + pea sequence proved to be more newlineeconomical and high gross returns (and#8377;548957 ha-1 newline) and highest net returns per rupee newlineinvested (and#8377;423017 ha-1 newline). In terms of quality, integrated nutrient management newlineproduction system with maize-wheat cropping sequence proved to be high in newlinecarbohydrate yield, fat yield and in energy equivalents. Integrated nutrient newlinemanagement with maize + soybean radish onion resulted in high protein yield. newlineApplication of conservation agriculture in combination with maize + cowpea- wheat + newlinegram cropping sequence resulted significant increase in organic carbon, available newlinenitrogen, phosphorus, potassium and also improve soil health of the syste