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Abstract: |
Tropical regions usually
experience intermittent rainfall and this affects maize
production in most tropical countries where irrigation
facilities are inadequate. The pot experiment was conducted
at the School of agriculture Teaching and research Farm,
University of cape Coast, to investigate the effect of
intermittent water application on maize growth and yield
parameters. A randomized complete block design was used with
three replications. Four different water amounts of
correspondingly different frequency intervals were used as
treatments: 300 cm3 water at 3-day intervals (T1); 490 cm3
water at 5-day intervals (T2); 770 cm3 water at 7-day
intervals (T3); and 1150 cm3 water at 9-day intervals. The
results showed no significant (p ≤ 5%) difference among the
treatments on the germination rate. However, the effect of
the treatments on all the other maize growth and yield
parameters determined showed significant (p ≤ 5%)
differences and followed similar trend in the order of T3 >
T2 > T4 > T. In conclusion, even though maize production in
the study area increased with increasing water amount at
long application intervals, prolonged interval of 9-days
reduced the maize performance even with increased water
amount. |
