Book of Extended summaries ISDA

International Conference on Reimagining Rainfed Agro-ecosystems: Challenges &
Opportunities during 22-24, December 2022 at ICAR-CRIDA, Hyderabad
proportion) were laid along the field slope gradient. Strips were replicated five times in a
randomised block design. Each strip was subdivided into 10 grids (along slope, N-S) and soil
and crop measurements/samples were taken from the centroids of each grid, which were
marked with gps (Fig. 1).Soil samples were analysed for soil texture, nitrogen, carbon and
pH.Crops were sown at recommended seeding density: i.e. 320 plants per sq.m for SC oat, 80
plants per sq.m for SC pea and half the seeding density of each crop in the intercrops. All
treatments were applied 50 kg/ha of mineral N fertiliser, without any irrigation and other
agrochemicals. At maturity, plant samples from 1 sq.m were hand-harvested from all the
centroids and oven-dried for estimating grain and biomass weights.
Results
The study site received only 30mm of precipitation during 01 May-01 August in 2018, which
was about one-fourth of the average precipitation during this period. This affected the crops,
specially the pea. At harvest, oat yield tended to be higher in areas with high soil ECa values
(conductivity).
Plot layout on ECa map; Dry matter oat grain yield in Kg/ha on soil N heat map.
In areas with low soil N content, IC seemed to have advantage over SC in terms of oat yield.
On the other hand, yields of IC treatments tended to be equal or lower than SC oat yield in
areas with high soil N content (Fig. 2). Average oat grain yield from all sampling points in IC
was 2.6±1.65 t/ha (mean ± SD), despite having only 50% of the sole crop density, compared
to 3.07±2.24 t/ha in oat SC strips. This corresponds to about 78% of SC yield. The highest
weed biomass of 5.86 t/ha was recorded in SC pea, while the lowest weed in SC Oat (0.97
t/ha). The IC treatment recorded a weed biomass of 3.27 t/ha.
Emerging approaches (RS, AI, ML, Drones etc) for crop management &assessment
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