Abstract

The greatest challenge lies to make rice cultivation more remunerative by inclusion of different crops in fallow periods of rice-based cropping systems is often hindered due to residual effects of fallow grown crops on succeeding rice crop. Therefore, a field study was undertaken during summer 2018 at College of Agriculture, Kerala Agricultural University, Kasaragod, Kerala, India to find the residual effect of various pulse crops (cowpea, black gram, green gram and red gram) grown in summer fallows of double cropped lowland paddy fields under varying nitrogen doses on succeeding rice crop grown in the same plot. Growth attributes like plant height (108.8 cm), tillers per m2 (341.0), yield parameters like number of productive tillers per m2 (255.7), grain yield (5035.0 kg/ha), straw yield (11037.0 kg/ha), harvest index (0.38) were at par in all treatments in rice cultivated after pulse crops. The thousand grain weight was highest in plots where cowpea (27.02 g) and green gram (26.91 g) with 100% Recommended Dose of Nitrogen (RDN) (90:45:45 kg/ha) were grown during summer. The N uptake of rice (321.3 kg per ha) was significant with red gram (75% RDN). The economic parameters viz., gross returns (199833.3 Rs./ha), net returns (106754 Rs. per ha), benefit cost (B:C) (2.11) ratio was on par among all treatments in rice. There is no adverse effect on rice from pulses even when nutrient stress was induced.