Intercultural Operations, Crop Rotation and Mixed Cropping in Wheat Cultivation
Intercultural Operations:
1. Usually no intercultural is given to the rainfed wheat crop.
2. But in case of irrigated crop one hoeing is done when the crop is about 15 to 18 days old to remove the weeds and prolongs the first irrigation.
3. In addition to this one to two hand weedings are also given for aerating the soil and light earthing up.
Rotation:
It is not desirable to grow wheat year after year on the same piece of land.
The rotations followed in wheat care:
i) Mung/udid/soyabean (kharif) – wheat (rabi)
ii) Paddy/bajri/jowar (kharif) – – wheat (rabi)
iii) Groundnut/sesamum (kharif) – wheat (rabi)
iv) On irrigated lands wheat is rotated with cotton, sugarcane and mustard.
Mixed Cropping:
1. Usually 12 different types of crops are sown mixed with wheat.
2. Among these gram, linseed and mustard are very commonly grown mixed with wheat.
3. Mixed cropping in dry cultivation is followed to safe guard the crop stand.
4. Mixed cropping with legume (gram) improves the nitrogen status of the soil.
5. It is done either by mixing wheat seed with seeds of gram or by sowing 15 rows of wheat alternated with 3 rows of gram crop.