ABSTRACT
Soil acidity is one of the soil chemical degradation problems affecting soil productivity in the Ethiopian highlands. So, amendment of these soils is of paramount importance to enhance their productivity. This study was conducted during the 2019 and 2020 cropping seasons to examine the effect of micro-dosing lime rate application on bread wheat yield and yield components on acidic soils of Banja district, northwestern Ethiopia. The study was carried out in two sets where two different types of liming materials namely calcitic and quick lime were used separately. Both were a one factor experiments constituting five level of lime (0, 6.25, 12.5, 25 and 33.3% of the recommended rate) arranged in randomized complete block design with three replications. Lime requirement of the soil was calculated based on its exchangeable acidity in which the major quality parameter of liming material: chemical (neutralizing value) and physical (fineness) properties were well considered. Wheat grain yield, thousand seed weight, biomass yield, harvesting index, plant height, panicle length and number of seeds per plant were collected at recommended time. Then data were managed properly using the Excel computer software and subjected to the analysis of variance using the SAS software. However, mean of plant height, spikes length, numbers of seed per plant, biomass yield and thousand seeds weight were progressively increased with incremental levels of lime application. Grain yield recorded from the application of 25 and 33.3 % Calcite lime rate resulted in 85.8 and 87.1 % increment to the control and 36.3 and 37.2% increment to the 6.25% recommended lime rate. Similarly, application of 25 and 33.3 % Quick lime rate resulted in 52.7 and 53.8 % increment to the control. The optimum economic return (21,663.76 and 18,642.06 ETB ha-1) was recorded from 25% recommended Calcite and Quick lime rates, respectively.
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