Studies on Weed Management in Irrigated Maize

Field experiments were conducted during summer, 2014 and 2015at the Annamalai University Experimental Farm, Department of Agronomy, Faculty of Agriculture. Annamalai Nagarto study the response of irrigated maize (Zea mays L) to various weed management practices, laid out in randomized block design with three replications. The experiment comprises of eleven treatments. Among the different weed control treatments, pre-emergence application of atrazine 1.0 kg ha-1 on 3 DAS + post emergence application of 2,4-D @ 0.75 kg ha-1 on 21 DAS excelled other treatments by recording higher values of growth and yield components such as plant height, LAI, DMP, cob length, number of grains cob-1, cob diameter etc., and the least weed population, weed biomass and nutrient depletion by weeds with the highest weed control index (91.38%) favouring higher yield attributes and grain yield (6342 kg ha-1). This was followed by preemergence application of metribuzin 1.0 kg ha-1 on 3 DAS + post emergence application of 2,4-D @ 0.75 kg ha-1 on 21 DAS. Unweeded control recorded the highest weeds counts and weed biomass resulting in very poor grain yield (2180 kg ha-1).