Synergizing weed - nitrogen management and optimizing productivity and profitability of rainfed baby corn (Zea mays L.)

Baby corn is a high nitrogen (N) demanding exhaustive crop. Weed infestation causes 39 % loss in yield under rainfed condition. An experiment comprising four weed management practices viz., W1: Atrazine 1.0 kg ha-1 (pre-emergence), W2: Tembotrione 90 g ha-1 + 2,4-D 400 g ha-1 (post emergence), W3 : W1 + manual weeding at 21 days after sowing (DAS), W4: Hoeing and weeding at 21 DAS allocated to main plots and five N management practices i.e. N1:100 % soil test-based N from chemical source (C100 % STN), N2: C75 % STN + farmyard manure (FYM) 25 % STN, N3: C75 % STN + vermicompost (VC)25 % STN, N4: C75 % STN + FYM12.5 % STN + vermicompost12.5 % STN and N5: C50 % STN + FYM25 % STN + vermicompost25 % STN allocated to sub plots were tried in split plot design with three replications at Bhubaneswar, India during kharif 2022 and 2023. The treatment combination W3N1 produced the maximum dehusked baby cob (2.38 t ha-1), keeping W3N3 and W3N4 at par whereas, W3N3 produced the maximum green fodder yield (27.48 t ha-1), keeping W3N1 and W1N3 at par. The treatment combination W3N1 recorded the maximum net return of 225.10 × 103 ₹ ha-1 and return per rupee investment of 3.89 as against 188.11 × 103 ₹ ha-1 and 3.20 with W3 and 189.74 × 103 ₹ ha-1 and 3.43, respectively with N1. Both baby cob and green fodder yield exhibited significant negative correlation with weed density and biomass. The treatment W3N1 gave the maximum productivity and profitability, but W3N3 with similar yield is recommended considering productivity and long-term sustainability.