On Farm Evaluation of Conservation Tillage Techniques: An Option for Vulnerable House Hold at Dry Land Areas of Northern Ethiopia

摘要

Participatory evaluation of conservation tillage practice was conducted at low rain fall areas ofSouth Tigray, Ethiopia in 2014 cropping season. The treatments were tie-ridge with mulching, planting basin(direct and transplanted) with mulching and conventional with minimum of 5 times tillage. The experiment wasconducted on farmer’s field and a total of 35 farmers were participated. Early maturing (Hormat), mediummaturing (Kodem) and late maturing (Abaere) sorghum varieties were used in the experimentation. Significantly(P<0.05) more variation were observed among the tillage practices and varieties tested. In the early maturingvareitiy, the highest grain yield 2.39 t/ha and 2.37 t/ha were recorded from tie ridging and direct panting atplanting basin, while the lowest mean grain yield 0.9 t/ha was obtained from the conventional treatments. Forthe Kodem and Abaere sorghum land race the higher grain yield were obtained from planting basins (3.87 and5.59 t/ha, respectively). About 68% and 27% of the total respondents also select basin and tie-ridging,respectively. This finding provides evidence to scale up the culture of conservation tillage techniques (tieridging and planting basin) with component package in dry land areas of Tigray and allowing farmers toenhance crop yield in the low rain fall areas.