THE USE OF ORGANIC MANURE SUPPLEMENTED WITH INORGANIC FERTILIZER IN CROP PRODUCTION IN THE NORTHERN GUINEA SAVANNA ZONE OF NIGERIA

THE USE OF ORGANIC MANURE SUPPLEMENTED WITH INORGANIC FERTILIZER IN CROP PRODUCTION IN THE NORTHERN GUINEA SAVANNA ZONE OF NIGERIA

Abstract:

Green house and field studies were carried out in the 1993 cropping season to evaluate the use of organic manure supplemented by inorganic fertilizer in the Northern Guinea Savanna Zone of Nigeria. The studies were carried out in Samaru (11° ll’N, 07° 38’E), Institute for Agricultural Research, Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria. The treatments consisted of factorial combinations of five rates of organic manure (0, 2.5, 5.0, 7.5 and lOtha-1) and five levels of H.P.K. fertilizers (H0P0K0; H40P20K20′ N80P40K40- ^ 2 0 ^ 0 ^ 0 a n d N160P80K30>’ l a i d o u t in a randomized complete block design with three replications. Maize was used as the test crop in the twc experiments. Maize shoot and root DMY, generally increased with increasing rates of organic manure and inorganic fertilizer. Organic manure increased shoot and root DMY up to 5.0t ha while increases due to inorganic fertilzier were linear and significant up to 160:80:80 Kgha-1 rate. The interaction effects, though not significant, showed that combination of 40:20:20 Kgha-1 and 2.5 tha-1 gave slightly higher shoot and root DMY than 120:60:60 or 160:80.80 Kgha-1 fertilizer alone by 56.6 and 58.4 percent, respectively. In the field organic manure significantly (at P = 0.05) increased grain yield, 1000-grain weight, cob length, harvest index and shelling percentage, while stover yield, number of kernel per cob and cob diameter were not significantly affected. With inorganic fertilizer, grain yield and all other yield components were significantly increased. The interaction effects, although not significant, show that plots receiving combination of 40:20:20 Kgha-1 and 2.5 tha-1 gave slightly higher grain yield than plots receiving 120:60:60 or 160:30:80 Kgha-1 alone. The percentage increases are 18.06 and 15.78 respectively. Generally, nutrient concentrations in plant tissues from the Green house study tended to decrease with increasing rates of organic manure and inorganic fertilizer. The decreases were significant (at 5% level of significance) for some of the elements. Uptake values on the other hand tended to increase with increasing rate of organic manure and inorganic fertilizer. In the field, nutrient concentrations of the plant samples were significantly affected by organic manure, while values significantly (5% level) increased with increasing rates of inorganic fertilizer.

THE USE OF ORGANIC MANURE SUPPLEMENTED WITH INORGANIC FERTILIZER IN CROP PRODUCTION IN THE NORTHERN GUINEA SAVANNA ZONE OF NIGERIA

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