INTEGRATED NUTRIENT MANAGEMENT STRATEGIES FOR INCREASING ANNUAL FORAGE CROPS PRODUCTIVITY– A REVIEW
MUKESH KUMAR*, BHAGAT SINGH AND A. K. DHAKA
Department of Agronomy
CCS Haryana Agricultural University,
Hisar-125 004 (Haryana), India
*(e-mail : mukeshkumarkainwal@gmail.com)
(Received : 4 February 2017; Accepted : 7 March 2017)
SUMMARY
The scope of increasing the area cultivated for forages is rather limited, because of mounting pressure and preferential need for food and commercial crops. Hence, fodder production has to be increased per unit area per unit time. In recent years, there has been adverse effect of continuous and indiscriminate use of inorganic fertilizers on deterioration of soil structure, soil organic matter, increase in salinity, sodicity, increased soil pollutants, reduced soil health, hazards of pests and diseases and environmental pollution. Judicious use of manures and fertilisers in integrated manner is best alternative for maintaining crop productivity, while maintaining soil fertility status in forage crops. Integrated nutrient management (INM) improves crop productivity and soil fertility status rather than mineral fertilizers alone. Most of the research findings reviewed in this review indicated that among the integrated nutrient management combinations, application of chemical fertilizers integrated with organic manures in equal proportion improved sustainable forage productivity, nutrient uptake and soil nutrient status. Use of organic manures has been found to be promising in arresting the decline in productivity through correction of deficiency of secondary and micronutrients and influencing the physical and biological properties of soil. Combined application of inorganic fertilizers with different sources of organic manures in different proportions has significant role to boost forage productivity, improve nutrient uptake by plants and maintain soil nutrient status in foragebased cropping systems. Keeping these points in view, the literature pertaining to the nutrient management in different forage crops to obtain higher biomass production and good quality fodder has been reviewed.
Key words: Forage crops, INM, fodder yield, quality