Mehak Fatima1, Muhammad Nazim 2,3*, Tanveer Ul Haq1, 5, Qurat-Ul-Ain Sadiq1, Abida Hussain4 and Muqarrab Ali5
1Department of Soil Sciences, Faculty of Agriculture and Environmental Sciences, Muhammad Nawaz Shareef University of Agriculture, Multan, 66000, Pakistan 2State Key Laboratory of Desert and Oasis Ecology, Key Laboratory of Ecological Safety and Sustainable Development in Arid Lands, Xinjiang Institute of Ecology and Geography, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Urumqi, 830011, PR China 3University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100049, PR China 4Department of Botany, University of Agriculture Faisalabad, Pakistan 5Department of Climate Change, Faculty of Agriculture and Environmental Sciences, Muhammad Nawaz Shareef University of Agriculture, Multan, 66000, Pakistan
*Corresponding author: nazimaslam53@gmail.com
Drought stress is a most imperative environmental factor that often constrains crop production worldwide. The less availability of organic matter in soil and less available water are the major ecological issues to the world food security. In the current investigation, a pot experiment was conducted to the effect of animal manure and biochar on morpho-physiological and quality parameters of maize under well water and water deficit conditions. The maize hybrid 30-32-30 was grown in pots by using CRD factorial arrangement. The experiment was comprised of four treatments and five replications under both well water and water deficit. Treatments were consisting of sole and combined application of animal manure and biochar @ 10 t ha-1 while the combination have 1:1 ratio under both water regimes. Pots under well water were irrigated at 100% FC, while water deficit were irrigated on bases of 50% FC. After about 2 months of sowing, data related to its morpho-physiological and quality attributes were recorded. The observations revealed that deficit irrigation negatively affects the growth and quality of maize. The loss in shoot fresh and dry biomass was 38.5 and 42.5% under deficit irrigation as compared to well-watered control, however, combined applied animal manure and biochar improved it 48.5 and 71.3%, respectively. Similarly, root fresh and dry biomass were decreased to 44.8 and 86.4% by deficit irrigation, therefore, maximum improvement i.e. 68.8 and 96.4% was observed under the combination of organic matter and biochar. However, combined application of animal manure and biochar also best improved stem girth (67%), stem length (35%), no. of leaves plant-1 (67.7%), no. of nodes plant-1 (75%), chlorophyll contents (16.6%), Water use efficiency (93.3%) and photosynthetic rate (45%) as compare to control treatment, under water deficit conditions, showing that the combined application of amendments is more useful for maize growth than the sole application. However, the stomatal conductance and transpiration rate were reduced to 9.3 and 17.1% under combined use of animal manure and biochar in deficit irrigation treatments. Therefore, it is concluded that maize production can be improved by the combined use of biochar and animal manure under deficit irrigation, however detailed field research is required before wide applications in the field.