Influence of irrigation regimes and mycorrhizal inoculation on the performance of wheat in pot culture

Abstract

In order to find out the effect of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) and level of irrigation on wheat, an experiment was conducted in the net house of Department of Agronomy, Bangladesh Agricultural University during November 2018 to April 2019. The study included two levels of AMF inoculation (inoculated and non-inoculated) and three levels of irrigation (viz., no irrigation, one irrigation during CRI stage, and two irrigations at tillering and flowering stages respectively). The treatment combinations were applied to two wheat varieties, viz., BARI Gom-25 and BARI Gom-30. The pot experiment was laid out in randomized complete block design (RCBD) with three replications. Commercially available mycorrhizal inoculum (Gigaspora margarita) was used to inoculate the plants of respective treatment pots. The performances of these wheat varieties under two AMF inoculation levels (inoculated and non-inoculated) showed that both varieties were significantly affected by AMF inoculation. Though all growth and yield contributing parameters were not significantly affected by AMF application, it was evident that AMF inoculation helped the wheat plants to grow vigorously and produce higher yield. Both wheat varieties showed their best performance under two irrigation treatment but when inoculation was imposed, it gave better performance than non-inoculated pot. The highest yield was recorded with pots which were inoculated with AMF in both wheat varieties. It was observed that in both varieties, irrigation helps wheat to perform better in terms of all parameters in comparison to no irrigation condition, and two irrigations gave better results than that of one irrigation. AMF inoculation gave higher yield in non-irrigated pots in comparison to non-inoculated non-irrigated pots. Inoculation with AMF increased 25\\% grain yield plant-1 compared to the non-inoculated pots. The results suggest that farmers could be advised to grow wheat in drought prone areas using AMF.