Optimization of Nitrogen Fertilizer and Irrigation in Wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) Cultivation by Central Composite Design

Document Type : Scientific - Research

Authors

1 Department of Agrotechnology, Faculty of Agriculture, Ferdowsi University of Mashhad, Mashhad, Iran

2 Department of Agronomy, Faculty of Agriculture, University of Gonabad,Gonabad, Iran

Abstract

Introduction
Cereals are the most important crops all around the world and among them, wheat has the first rank in terms of production and the cultivation area. This plant is one of the main agricultural products in Iran and provides 45% of calories and 70% of the protein consumed by the Iranian people. Irrigation and soil nutrient availability are considered as main factors affecting the wheat yield. Nowadays, intensive application of these inputs in the conventional agricultural systems is considered to achieve maximum yield, whereas surplus use of them does not only have any significant positive influence on the yield but also has been led to environmental problems for example by leaching the nitrogen losses to underground water and imposes extra costs to the agricultural ecosystems. Therefore, the present study was conducted to optimize the application amount of nitrogen fertilizer and irrigation in wheat by using central composite design technique.
 
Materials and methods
In order to determine the optimal application rates of nitrogen and water in wheat cultivation, a field experiment was conducted based on central composite design in the research field of Ferdowsi University of Mashhad during the 2011 growing season. The treatments were designed based on low and high levels of nitrogen (0 and 400 kg urea.ha-1) and irrigation (2500 and 5000 m3). Central point in each treatment repeated five times and the number of treatments were calculated based on 2k + 2k + r, in which k is the number of evaluating factors (nitrogen and irrigation) and r is the replication number of the central point. Therefore, 13 combination treatments were designed. Several features including seed yield, biological yield, nitrogen losses, nitrogen use efficiency and water use efficiency were measured as dependent variables and response surface of these variables under each combination treatment was calculated by regression model. Finally, the optimum values of water and nitrogen consumption were determined according to three scenarios including economic, environmental and economic-environmental scenarios.
Results and discussion
The results indicated a positive effect of increasing nitrogen fertilization and irrigation on seed yield, biological yield and water use efficiency. Whereas, increasing irrigation level led to decreasing nitrogen use efficiency and increasing nitrogen losses. Finally, the optimum levels of nitrogen and irrigation were estimated based on three scenarios including economic, environmental and economic- environmental. In economic scenario, the optimum levels of fertilizer and irrigation were estimated 274 kg urea.ha-1 and 3964 m3.ha-1, respectively to obtain 4045 kg.ha-1 seed yield and 9908 kg.ha-1 biological yield. In environmental scenario, the optimum levels of the treatments to obtain the minimum nitrogen losses amounts were 64.65 kg urea.ha-1 and 2651 m3.ha-1, respectively. In economic-ecological scenario, both seed yield and nitrogen losses were considered, so the estimated input rates were 153 kg urea.ha-1 and 3030 m3.ha-1 irrigation. Simultaneous consideration of the economic aspects and environmental issues to the production in economic-ecological scenario shows the excellence of this scenario than other the two scenarios. 
Conclusion
In order to achieve sustainable production of crops, one of the basic principles is to improve resource efficiency and prevent agricultural input losses. Based on our results, it seems that the optimization values of nitrogen fertilization and irrigation calculated in the economic-environmental scenario which simultaneously considered both economic and environmental aspects of wheat production can be suggested as the most appropriate levels of these two factors according to the study conditions.
Acknowledgements
This study was financially supported by the Ferdowsi University of Mashhad, Iran (Grant number 17676/2).

Keywords


Aslan, N. 2007. Application of response surface methodology and central composite rotatable design for modeling the influence of some operating variables of a multi-gravity separator for chromite concentration. Powder Technology 86: 769–776.
Behera, S.K., and Panda, R.K. 2009. Effect of fertilization and irrigation schedule on water and fertilizer solute transport for wheat crop in a sub-humid sub-tropical region. Agriculture, Ecosystems and Environment 130: 141-155.
Bole, J.B., and Dubetz, S. 1986. Effect of irrigation and nitrogen fertilizer on the yield and protein content of soft white spring wheat. Canadian Journal of Plant Science 66: 281-289.
Boswell, F.C., Meisinger, J.J., and Case, W.L. 1985. Fertilizer technology and use: Production, marketing and use of nitrogen fertilizers. Soil Science Society of America publication. p. 229-292.
Box, G.E.P., and Wilson, K.B. 1952. On the experimental attainment of optimum conditions. Journal of the Royal Statistical Society 1: 13-18.
Box, G.E.P., and Hunter, J.S. 1957. Multi-factor experimental designs for exploring response surfaces. The Institute of Mathematical Statistics. p. 195-241.
Calderini, D., Torres- Leon, F., and Slafer, G.A. 1995. Consquences of wheat breeding on nitrogen and phosphorus yield, grain nitrogen and phosphorus concentration and associated traits. Annuls of Botany 76: 315- 322.
Caliandro, A., and Boari, F. 1992. Supplementary irrigation in arid and semi-arid regions. In: International conference on supplementary irrigation and drought water management, Italy, 27 September- 2 October.
Cossey, D.A., Thomason, W.E., Mullen, R.W., Wyun, K.J., Woolfolk, C.W., Johnson, G.V., and Raun, W.R. 2002. Relationship between ammonium and nitrate in wheat plant tissue and estimated nitrogen loss. Journal of Plant Nutrition 25 (7): 1429– 1442.
Davis, J.G., Westfall, D.G., Mortvedt, J.J., and Shanahan, J.F. 2002. Fertilizing winter wheat. Agronomy Journal 84: 1198-1203.
Dawson, J.C., Huggins, D.R., and Jones, S.S. 2008. Characterizing nitrogen use efficiency in natural and agricultural ecosystems to improve the performance of cereal crops in low-input and organic agriculture systems. Field Crops Research 107: 89-101.
FAO (Food and Agriculture organizations of the United Nations). 2013. FAOSTAT, agricultural production. [WWW document]. URLhttp://faostat3.fao.org/home/index.html.
Gan, Y., Malhi, S.S., Brandt, S., Katepa-Mupondwa, F., and Stevanson, C. 2008. Nitrogen use efficiency and nitrogen uptake of juncea Canola under diverse environments. Agronomy Journal 100: 285-295.
Haefner, J.W. 2005. Modeling Biological Systems: Principles and Applications. 2nd ed., Utah State University, USA.
Harper, L.A., Sharpe, R.R., Langdale, G.W., and Giddens, J.E. 1987. Nitrogen cycling in a wheat crop: Soil, plant and aerial nitrogen transport. Agronomy Journal 79: 965-973.
Hatfield, J.L., and Prueger, J.H. 2004. Nitrogen over-use, under-use, and efficiency. Crop Science 26: 156-168.
Hosseini, R., Galeshi, S., Soltani, A., and Kalateh, M. 2012. The effect of nitrogen on yield and yield component in modern and old wheat cultivars. Electronic Iranian Journal of Crop Production 4: 187-199. (In Persian with English Summary).
Kiziloglu, F.M., Sahin, U., Kuslu, Y., and Tunc, T. 2009. Determining water-yield relationship, water use efficiency, crops and pan coefficients for silage maize in a semiarid region. Irrigation Science 27: 129-137.
Koocheki, A., Nassiri Mahallati, M., Moradi, R., and Mansouri, H. 2014. Optimizing of water, nitrogen and density in canola cultivation by central composite design. Soil Science and plant Nutrition 60 (2): 286-298.
Li, Z.Z., Li, W.D., and Li, W.L. 2004. Dry-period irrigation and fertilizer application affect water use and yield of spring wheat in semiarid regions. Agricultural Water Management 65: 133–143.
Mahajan, G., Chauhan, B.S., Timsina, J., Singh, P.P., and Singh, K. 2012. Crop performance and water-and nitrogen-use efficiencies in dry-seeded rice in response to irrigation and fertilizer amounts in northwest India. Field Crops Research 134: 59-70.
Mahler, R.L., Koehler, F.E., and Lutcher, L.K. 1994. Nitrogen source, timing of application and placement: Effects on winter wheat production. Agronomy Journal 86: 637-642.
Mei-Hua, D., Xiao-Jun, S., Yu-Hua, T., Bin, Y., Shao-Lin, Z., Zhao-Liang, Z., and Kimura, S.D. 2012. Orimizing nitrogen fertilizer application for rice production in the Taihu lake region, China. Pedosphere 22: 48-57.
Ortiz, R., Nurminen, M., Madsen, S., Rognil, O.A., and Bjornstad, A. 2002. Genetic gains in Nordic spring barley breeding over sixty years. Euphytica 126: 283-289.
Pandy, P.K., Maranville, J.W., and Admou, A. 2001. Tropical wheat response to irrigation and nitrogen in a sahelian environment. I. Grain yield, yield components and water use efficiency. European Journal of Agronomy 15: 93-105.
Raun, W.R., and Johnson, G.V. 1991. Improving nitrogen use efficiency for cereal production. Agronomy Journal 91: 357- 363.
Ritter, W.F. 1980. Nitrate leaching under irrigation in the US: a review. Journal of Environmental Health 24: 349–378.
Rong, Y., and Xuefeng, W. 2011. Effects of nitrogen fertilizer and irrigation rate on nitrate present in the profile of a sandy farmland in Northwest China. Procedia Environmental Sciences 11: 726-732.
Sandhu, K.S., Arora, V.K., Chand, R., Sandhu, B.S., and Khera, K.L. 2000. Optimizing time distribution of water supply and fertilizer nitrogen rates in relation to targeted wheat yields. Experimental Agriculture 36: 115–125.
Shahsavari, N., and Saffari, M. 2005. Effect of amount of nitrogen on yield and yield components of three bread wheat cultivars in Kerman. Iranian Journal of Agricultural Sciences 18: 81-87. (In Persian with English Summary)
Whalley, W.R., Clark, L.J., Gowing, D.J.G., Cope, R.E., Lodge, R.J., and Leeds- Harrison, P.B. 2006. Does soil strength play a role in wheat yield losses caused by soil drying? Plant and Soil 280:279–90.
Wu, C.F.J., and Hamada, M. 2000. Experiments: Planning, Analysis, and Parameter Design Optimization. New York, 760 pp.
Zhou, X., Wang, H., Chen, Q., and Ren, J. 2007. Coupling effects of depth of film-bottomed tillage and amount of irrigation and nitrogen fertilizer on spring wheat yield. Soil & Tillage Research 94: 251-261.
CAPTCHA Image