A large number of research papers and reviews have been published during last two decades on site-specific and need based fertilizer nitrogen management in irrigated rice. However, it becomes a huge challenge to follow those site-specific fertilizer management practices in rice where the farmers have no control on water management. Kindly give your thoughts as to how site-specific fertilizer nitrogen management practices can be used in rainfed rice.
A major challenge is to simplify the approach for wider scale dissemination without sacrificing components that are crucial to its success. An optical sensor based analysis management evaluated for rice field area. The many theoretical and technical limitations of soil-test based approaches may therefore be overcome by simple and robust plant-based indicators of nutrient supply such as grain yield in omission plots and leaf color. Leaf color charts can be used as an on-farm guide for N management, since field-specific decisions for N management are probably required to achieve the best match between highly variable plant N demand and fertilizer N application.
Prem Baboo I agree with what you have said but it is valid only in irrigated rice conditions or when water is at command of the farmer. The challenge is - how to use optical sensors, chlorophyll meters or leaf colour charts when rice is rainfed, that is you never know when there will be an irrigation event. Let us accept this challenge and develop some techniques and strategies for site-specific nutrient management in rainfed rice.
@ Singh, beside optical sensor, chlorophyll meter or leaf color chart as Dr. Babu has rightly mentioned, one more thing is more important is the cultivar specificity for N management of rainfed rice. Shorter growth duration may be preferred to avoid late season drought and the higher physiological efficiency of N use for yield production.
This is not my circle of competence. It sounds like you need to control the releas of nitrogen, sine you can not control the exchange of water in the field. Would using a slow release nitrogen product provide a more uniform delivery of available nitrogen?
How about also managing the timing of fertilizer inputs depending on plant growth requirement to avoid losses.
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