Effect of Different Levels of Nitrogen and Silicon in Rice under Red and Laterite Soil

A field experiment was conducted at Agriculture Farm, Institute of Agriculture, Visva-Bharati, Sriniketan, West Bengal, during kharif season of 2021-22 and 2022-23 in order to assess the performance of rice under various levels of nitrogen and silicon in red and laterite soil of West Bengal. The experiment was laid out in split plot design with three levels of nitrogen in main plots and five levels of silicon in sub plots. In the pooled data of both the years, among the main plots, treatment N3 with nitrogen applied @ 20 kg/ha as basal + LCC-4 at 20 kg N/ha had the highest plant height (141.24 cm), dry matter accumulation (1411.97 g/sq. m) at harvest, LAI at 60 DAT (4.88), number of tillers per sq. m at harvest (273.94), panicle length (29.04 cm), panicle number (263.82), number of filled grains (102.51), test weight (25.2 g), rice grain yield (6.17 t/ha), straw yield (8.25 t/ha), protein content (7.22%) and protein yield (446.78 kg/ha). Among the sub-plots, treatment S5 with SiO2 applied @ 400 kg/ha recorded the highest plant height (137.98 cm), dry matter accumulation (1337.48 g/sq. m) at harvest, LAI at 60 DAT (4.74), number of tillers per sq. m at harvest (272.91), panicle length (29.53 cm), panicle number (259.73), number of filled grains (105.37), test weight (25.3 g), rice grain yield (5.83 t/ha), straw yield (7.86 t/ha), protein content (7.65 %) and protein yield (445.81 kg/ha).