Studying the effects of interrupted irrigation on the response of two safflower cultivars under spring and summer sowing conditions

Subject Areas : Sustainable production technologies

Sholeh Danaei ¹ , Babak Pasari ² , Asad Rokhzadi ³

1 - Graduated MSc Student, Department of Agronomy and Plant Breeding, Sanandaj Branch, Islamic Azad University, Sanandaj, Iran.
2 - Assistant professor, Department of Agronomy and plant breeding, Sanandaj branch, Islamic Azad University, Sanandaj, Iran.
3 - Department of Agronomy and Plant Breeding, Sanandaj Branch, Islamic Azad University, Sanandaj, Iran

Received: 2023-01-11 Accepted : 2023-03-20 Published : 2023-02-20

Keywords: Water stress, Yield, Sowing date, Safflower,

Abstract :

In order to study the effects of water deficit stress on two safflower cultivars under spring and summer sowing conditions, an experiment was conducted in a split-split-plot layout based on a randomized complete block design with three replications in 2017 at the research farm of agriculture faculty, Islamic Azad University, Sanandaj Branch. The main factor was the sowing date including spring and summer dates. The sub-factor was drought stress with two levels (full irrigation and interrupted irrigation at the flowering stage). The sub-sub-factor was cultivar including Sina and Faraman. The heads number per plant and seed yield in spring sowing significantly increased compared to summer sowing. In spring sowing conditions, yield and its components were significantly decreased as the result of water deficit stress during the flowering stage compared with full irrigation however in summer sowing conditions, stress had no effect on the above-mentioned traits. The highest rate of seed yield (3287 kg/ha) was obtained in the spring sowing of Faraman cultivar with full irrigation, and there was no significant difference between the two cultivars with respect to seed yield, under stress conditions in spring or summer sowing conditions. According to the results of this experiment, in summer sowing conditions there were no advantages from irrigation at the flowering stage compared with interrupted irrigation at the flowering stage, therefore in the case of shifting the sowing time from spring to summer, it will be possible to save the water by interrupting the irrigation at flowering stage accordingly an acceptable yield may be attained as a second crop.