Field Performance Evaluation of Zone Disk Tiller Machine for Soil Physical Properties and its Relative Impact on Wheat Crop Recovery in Cotton Stubble field
Field Performance Evaluation of Zone Disk Tiller Machine for Soil Physical Properties and its Relative Impact on Wheat Crop Recovery in Cotton Stubble field
Muhammad Adnan Islam1,2*, Muhammad Iqbal2, Zia-ul-Haq2,3, Muhammad Mohsin Ali1, Hafiz Sultan Mahmood1, Shabbir Ahmed Kalwar1, Liaqat Ali Shahid1, Badar Munir Khan Niazi1 and Muzammil Husain1
ABSTRACT
Wheat and cotton are two most important crops of Pakistan. Due to late picking of cotton, wheat growing period is delayed and the farmers sown wheat in the December and January due to long process of field preparation by conventional method. Zone disc tiller machine developed in the department of Farm Machinery and Power, was employed for sowing wheat instead of conventional tillage in cotton stubble to avoid further late sowing of wheat. Zone disc tiller drill sows crop in strips. Strip tillage of soil reduced labour, fuel, irrigation and machinery costs. Zone disk tiller was tested for its field performance with three different types of furrow openers viz; disk furrow opener, reverse hoe furrow opener and hoe furrow opener. Statistical design, RCBD, was employed to evaluate the machine performance in comparison with conventional method of wheat sowing in cotton harvested field. In this study, moisture content (15.72 %), bulk density (1.41 g/cm3) and penetration resistance (875.21 kPa) were found 1.73, 1.23 and 1.48 times more under zone disc tiller machine as compared with conventional tillage moisture content (9.07%), bulk density (1.14 g/cm3) and penetration resistance (519 kPa). Seedling emergence rate index (11.26 %), number of tillers/m2(372) and grain yield (2984.58 kg/ha) were also found 1.1, 1.14 and 1.00 times more under zone disc tiller drill as compared with conventional tillage emergence rate index (10.18 %), number of tillers/m2(326) and grain yield (2975.55 kg/ha) respectively. The treatment vise fuel consumption was high under conventional tillage (T10) produced significantly greater fuel consumption (60.11 l/ha) while lowest fuel consumption was recorded under treatment T3 with disk coulter at speed three (11.83l/ha).
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