Yield and protein responses to nitrogen, and nitrogen fertiliser requirements of grain sorghum, in relation to soil nitrate levels

Abstract

Sorghum fertiliser experiments at 40 sites on the north-western slopes andplains of New South Wales demonstrated that many soils are severely deficientin nitrogen (N), but most yield responses to fertiliser N occurred on sites inthe southern part of the region. Grain yields responded to fertiliser in fewerthan half of the experiments but protein concentrations responded in about75%.There were 4 distinct types of protein response curve, and the type of curvewas related to the degree of N deficiency. In the most deficient experiments(mean protein 6·1% or less), response curves were convex to thex -axis or linear; at intermediate deficiency (mean protein7·2%), response curves were sigmoid; and at low deficiency (meanprotein 9·7%), response curves were Mitscherlich. Yield responsenever occurred where grain protein was >10%.Maximum grain yield responses and amounts of fertiliser N for maximum profit,estimated by fitting the Mitscherlich equation to response curves, weresignificantly correlated with soil nitrate N levels at various depths in thesouthern experiments, but not in the northern experiments. This difference inN responses appeared to be caused by lower rainfall and higher soil N in mostof the northern experiments. Nitrate-N levels in soils sampled to 15 or 30 cmdepth were better correlated with yield response ( r> 0·81) and fertiliser requirement (r >0·72) than N levels to deeper depths.There was little or no fertiliser N recovery in the grain in the northern experiments but substantial recovery in the south where it was generallygreater than recovery by wheat in earlier experiments in the same region.Fertiliser requirement in relation to soil nitrate-N levels was lower thanthat of these wheat experiments. This was attributed to mid-spring soilsampling for sorghum which underestimates the soil N available to the sorghum