Assessing corn recovery from early season nutrient stress under different soil moisture regimes

Solomon Amissah; Godfred Ankomah; Robert D Lee; Calvin D Perry; Bobby J Washington; Wesley M Porter; Simerjeet Virk; Corey J Bryant; George Vellidis; Glendon H Harris; Miguel Cabrera; Dorcas H Franklin; Juan C Diaz-Perez; Henry Y Sintim

doi:10.3389/fpls.2024.1344022

Assessing corn recovery from early season nutrient stress under different soil moisture regimes

Front Plant Sci. 2024 Mar 6:15:1344022. doi: 10.3389/fpls.2024.1344022. eCollection 2024.

Authors

Affiliations

¹ Department of Crop and Soil Sciences, University of Georgia, Tifton, GA, United States.
² C. M. Stripling Irrigation Research Park, University of Georgia, Camilla, GA, United States.
³ Delta Research and Extension Center, Mississippi State University, Stoneville, MS, United States.
⁴ Department of Crop and Soil Sciences, University of Georgia, Athens, GA, United States.
⁵ Department of Horticulture, University of Georgia, Tifton, GA, United States.

Abstract

Corn (Zea mays) biomass accumulation and nutrient uptake by the six-leaf collar (V6) growth stage are low, and therefore, synchronizing nutrient supply with crop demand could potentially minimize nutrient loss and improve nutrient use efficiency. Knowledge of corn's response to nutrient stress in the early growth stages could inform such nutrient management. Field studies were conducted to assess corn recovery from when no fertilizer application is made until the V6 growth stage, and thereafter, applying fertilizer rates as those in non-stressed conditions. The early season nutrient stress and non-stress conditions received the same amount of nutrients. As the availability of nutrients for plant uptake is largely dependent on soil moisture, corn recovery from the early season nutrient stress was assessed under different soil moisture regimes induced via irrigation scheduling at 50% and 80% field capacity under overhead and subsurface drip irrigation (SSDI) systems. Peanut (Arachis hypogaea) was the previous crop under all conditions, and the fields were under cereal rye (Secale cereale) cover crop prior to planting corn. At the V6 growth stage, the nutrient concentrations of the early season-stressed crops, except for copper, were above the minimum threshold of sufficiency ranges reported for corn. However, the crops showed poor growth, with biomass accumulation being reduced by over 50% compared to non-stressed crops. Also, the uptake of all nutrients was significantly lower under the early season nutrient stress conditions. The recovery of corn from the early season nutrient stress was low. Compared to non-stress conditions, the early season nutrient stress caused 1.58 Mg ha^-1 to 3.4 Mg ha^-1 yield reduction. The percent yield reduction under the SSDI system was 37.6-38.2% and that under the overhead irrigation system was 11.7-13%. The high yield reduction from the early season nutrient stress under the SSDI system was because of water stress conditions in the topsoil soil layer. The findings of the study suggest ample nutrient supply in the early season growth stage is critical for corn production, and thus, further studies are recommended to determine the optimum nutrient supply for corn at the initial growth stages.

Keywords: adaptive nutrient management; corn productivity; nutrient dilution effects; nutrient stress; residual soil nutrients; soil moisture.

Grants and funding

The author(s) declare that financial support was received for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article. Financial support for the research was provided by the Georgia Corn Commission (Award numbers AWD00012993 and AWD00014394). Funding was further provided by the USDA National Institute for Food and Agriculture through Hatch project 1026085.