Evaluation of Resource Conservation Technologies in Wheat Grown After Rice and Cotton

Wheat is the second most important staple food in India after rice. Three field experiments were conducted to compare the effect of laser leveling and traditional leveling on depth of irrigation water applied, water use efficiency and yield of wheat in rice-wheat and cotton-wheat rotations. Other resource conservation technologies evaluated were strip-till, no-till and raised bed planting. The study showed that wheat yield was highest (5.87 t/ha) under bed sowing on laser-leveled plots which was 9.5 per cent higher than on traditional leveled plots in cotton-wheat rotation. In rice-wheat rotation, the yield obtained was 5.28t/ha for strip-till treatment in laser-leveled plots which was 4.8 per cent higher than the traditional leveled plots for the same treatment. The highest water use efficiency was observed for conventional sowing treatment for laser-leveled plots (133 kg/ha-cm) under rice-wheat rotation on silt loam. The study suggests that laser land leveling is more water use efficient and produced higher wheat yield through efficient utilization of land and water resources.