Supplementary Irrigation and Soil Amendment Management with Sorghum on Khor Abu Habil (Sudan)

This research was conducted for 3 cropping seasons at Elobeid Research Station inWestern Sudan. The objectives were to improve the irrigation water and soil management and crop yield by evaluating the response of sorghum crop to different supplementary irrigation regimes and soil amendments management in flood basin irrigated scheme. The existing flood irrigation practice was basically conducive to late planting, weed growth, late season water stress and pest and diseases attack. Four levels of each irrigation regimes and farm yard manure (FYM) treatments arranged in split-plot design were tested. Rainfall, field capacity, irrigation water added, profile water content, plant height, yield components and water use efficiency were measured. Grain yield was significantly increased (p < 0.01) with irrigation treatments where 1919, 1870 and878 kg/ha were obtained for one, two and no irrigation treatments, respectively. The 3 irrigations treatment has produced relatively lower grain yield (1679 kg/ha). FYM treatment up to 4-8 t/ha showed increase in grain yield. Water added in 1, 2 and 3 irrigation treatments amounts to 4475, 5302 and6035 m³/ha, respectively which supplmented the rainfall by 23%, 45% and 65%, respectively. Water use efficiency was greater with 1 and 2 irrigation treatments and 4 t/ha FYM which reached 0.43, 0.35 and0.28 kg/m³, respectively. The result concludes that providing supplementary irrigation from crop establishment to mid season was found sufficient to improve crop productivity.