EFFECT OF VARIETIES AND DIFFERENT SOURCES OF NITROGEN FERTILIZER ON YIELD AND YIELD CONTRIBUTING CHARACTERS OF BABY CORN

Maize as well as baby corn is an exhaustive crop in terms of nutrient and water uptake from soil hence soil health become deteriorate easily and as different amounts and forms of nutrient supply in baby corn affect the productivity of baby corn so combination of organic and inorganic sources of nutrient is beneficial for soil heath and to maximize the productivity of baby corn thus an experiment was conducted at the Agronomy Field Laboratory, Bangladesh Agricultural University, Mymensingh during November 2017 to February 2018 to investigate the effect of varieties and sources of nitrogen fertilizer on yield and yield contributing characters of baby corn. The experiment was laid out in randomized complete block design (RCBD) with three replications. The experiment consisted of two varieties viz., BARI Sweet corn-1(V1), Baby star (V2) and five sources of nitrogen fertilizer viz.,100% recommended N from urea(N1),75% N from urea + 25% N from cowdung (N2), 50% N from urea + 50% N from cowdung (N3), 75% N from urea + 25% N from poultry manure(N4),50% N from urea + 50% N from poultry manure(N5).Yield and yield contributing characters of baby corn were significantly influenced by variety, sources of nitrogen fertilizer and their interactions. The highest number of cob plant-1 (1.67), cob length (13.50 cm), cob girth(3.84 cm), cob yield with husk (14.66 t ha-1), cob yield without husk (3.52 t ha-1), and fresh fodder yield (42.50 t ha-1) were recorded when Baby star was fertilized with N2 (75% N from urea + 25% N from cowdung) treatment. Therefore, it may be concluded that Baby star is the promising baby corn variety when coupled with (75% N from urea + 25% N from cowdung) for maximizing baby corn production and improving soil health.