Influence of sequential application of herbicides on growth and yield of wet-direct seeded rice in Kharif season

Sustaining rice yield is crucial for the country's GDP, but the diverse weed flora poses a significant biotic threat to maintaining yields in the Direct Seeded Rice (DSR) system. From the germination of crop seedlings to panicle initiation, the crop experiences severe competition for resources with rapidly growing weeds leading to substantial yield losses. In such scenarios sequential spraying of herbicides will provide a broad spectrum of weed control.Top of Form A field trial was performed on clay loamy soils of ICAR- Indian Institute of Rice Research, Rajendranagar, Hyderabad during kharif season of 2021 to assess the performance of MTU-1156 as persuaded by various weed management practices in wet-direct seeded rice. Amongst the weed management practices, hand weeding resulted in utmost plant height (118.0 cm), dry matter (14119.0 kg ha-1), LAI (4.36), grain yield (6463 kg ha-1) and straw yield (7589 kg ha-1) and it was in similarity to pretilachlor 50EC @ 500 g a.i. ha-1 as pre-emergence (PE) within 3 DAS fb penoxsulam (1.02%) + cyhalofop- butyl (5.1%) ready mix @ 150 g a.i. ha-1 as post emergence (PoE) at 15-20 DAS (T9), pretilachlor 50EC @ 500 g a.i. ha-1 as PE within 3 DAS fb triafamone 20% + ethoxysulfuron 10%WDG @ 67.5 g a.i. ha-1 at 2-4 leaf stage of weeds (T10) and pretilachlor 50EC @ 500 g a.i. ha-1 as PE within 3 DAS fb florpyrauxifen-benzyl (2%) + cyhalofop-butyl (10%) ready mix @ 150 g a.i. ha-1 as PoE at 15-20 DAS (T8). The increment in plant height with weed management practices was 11.3% to 25.1%, dry weight was 41.0 to 49.8%, grain yield was 45.6 to 54.0% and straw yield was 37.3 to 46.0%, over the weedy check. Sequential application of pretilachlor as PE and PoE application of herbicide combinations performed better in comparison to pyrazosulfuron-ethyl as PE and PoE application of herbicide combinations.