Effects of planting date, intensity of tiller separation and plant density on the yield of transplanted rice

Abstract

Experiments were conducted in Bangkok clay soil to investigate the influence of planting date, tiller separation and plant density on the yield and yield attributes of parent and clone plants of two transplanted rice varieties. The 15 July transplanting of mother crop and collected vegetative tillers and retransplanting on 15 August showed significantly high grain yield (3·8 t/ha). The photoperiod-insensitive variety RD23 gave higher yield (3·8 t/ha) than the photoperiod-sensitive variety KDML105 (3·0 t/ha). Tiller separation up to 4 tillers/hill did not adversely affect the mother crop. Vegetative tillers transplanted with 2–4 tillers/hill gave a similar yield as the mother crop in both the seasons. Vegetative tillers gave a higher yield than nursery seedlings transplanted on the same date. The yield components, i.e. weight of 1000 grains, grains/panicle and per cent filled grains, showed better responses with early transplanting of KDML105 in the mother crop and vegetative tillers except for panicle number and panicle length of vegetative tillers with RD23. The results suggest that in some flood-prone lowlands, where the transplanted crop is damaged by natural hazards, vegetative propagation using tillers separated (maximum 4/hill) from the previously established transplanted crop is beneficial for higher productivity.