Effect of Different Levels of Organic, Mineral Fertilization and Foliar Application with Some Nutrition Elements on Dry Seed Yield of Cowpea Plants

The effective nutrients management is requiring for increase the productivity and development of cowpea crop as suitable agronomic practice. A field experiment was conducted during the two summer seasons of 2018 and 2019 at Sakha Agricultural Research Station Farm, Kafr El-Sheikh Governorate, Egypt on cowpea (Vigna unguiculata L.) cv. Kafr El-Sheikh to study the impact of organic and inorganic fertilizers and foliar spray with K, Ca and B and their interactions on vegetative parameters, seed yield and leaf chemical composition as well as protein content and seeds germination percentage. Results indicated that, the highest values of vegetative growth parameters i.e., plant height (cm), No. of branches/plant, plant fresh and dry weights and chemical composition of leaves (N, P, K, Ca and B), as well as the percentage of protein and germination seeds were recorded by fertilized plants with 50% mineral + 50% organic (compost). Cowpea plants were sprayed with 1cm/l potassium sulfate showed better growth performance, higher values of chemical constituents especially N, P and K in leaves than unsprayed plants. Also, the best results on most growth parameters, leaves chemical constituents were resulted when plants were fertilized by 50% mineral as ammonium nitrate (50 kg/fed.) + 50% organic as compost (1.2 or1.3ton/fed.) and sprayed with potassium sulfate at 1cm/l. Therefore, this treatment could be recommended for improving cowpea plants performance under similar condition of this study.