Agronomic performance of Urochloa brizantha cv. Marandu cultivated in clayey and sandy soil submitted to water and nutritional management

Water and nutrient supply, as well as the soil texture, are some of the challenges that affect forage yield. Therefore, the objective of this work was to evaluate the agronomic performance of Urochloa brizantha cv. Marandu cropped in clayey and sandy soil submitted to water and nutritional management, in the municipality of Rio Verde, State of Goiás. The treatments consisted of a combination of soil with two textural classes (clayey and sandy), two levels of fertilization (A1: 30; 7 and 36 and A2: 45; 10.5 and 54 NPK per Mg DM, respectively), and seven water depths (0%, 25%, 50%, 75%, 100%, 125% and 150% of the crop evapotranspiration (ETc)), in four replicates. Crop performance was evaluated using SPAD index, plant height, leaf length, leaf width, leaf/stem ratio, crude protein, neutral detergent fiber, and dry matter. The data were subjected to multivariate data analysis. The principal component analysis allowed to observe that the first principal component explained 68.94% of the data, being characterized for promoting the best crop performance in relation to leaf length and width, characteristics that reflect in the other assessed variables. Forage performed poorly in winter because of the limitation of the climatic conditions. A higher yield was observed in the dry matter submitted to depths greater than 100% of ETc, regardless of the soil texture and the level of fertilization.