Time of Application of Nitrogen Fertilizer to Maize at Samaru, Nigeria

Abstract

SUMMARY: Maize was grown for three years at three levels of nitrogen, 56, 112 and 224 kg. N ha.⁻¹, involving altogether nine different timing and splitting treatments. Measurements were made of grain yield, plant nitrogen status and total-N-uptake, and, in one year, movement of nitrate-N in control plot soils. Where only 56 kg. N ha.⁻¹was applied, its time of application made very little difference to yield; at higher rates of nitrogen an unsplit application as late as seven weeks was very inefficient, but only at the highest rate did a split application give any appreciable yield increase over an unsplit application to the seed bed. Consideration of the soil nitrate-N data and the long-term pattern of rainfall distribution leads to the conclusion that leaching is unlikely to be a serious problem in the nitrogen nutrition of early-planted maize.