Effect of weed control technologies on chickpeas (Cicer arietinum L.) and weeds

Purpose. In our experiment, effect of weed technologies on chickpeas (Cicer arietium L.) was set up in 2018 and 2019 at the Szeged-Othalom experimental area.Methods. In the first year we applied mechanical weed control in addition to pre-emergence herbicide (May 19, 2018) and 6–8 leaf chickpeas (June 20, 2018) in addition to post-emergence herbicide treatments. The year 2019 was different in that after the pre-emergence treatment (April 10, 2019), the post-emergence treatment of chickpeas with 6–8 leaf condition (May 15, 2019) was repeated in the budding state (June 18, 2019). The yield components one way analysis of variance was prepared using SPSS 22 software and graphic representation of the development of the plants was carried out Svab's cumulative yield analysis.Results. The effect of the treatments of 2018 and 2019 on the yield elements of chickpeas can be illustrated graphically in Figure 1 and Figure 2. For both years, the data are from plots of the ʻRealeʼ variety, where the 100% level is made up of the yield elements of the weed-free plots, and the yield elements of the other treatments are compared to this. Figure 1 shows that the number of shoots per unit area (1 m2) of weed-free plots that did not control weeds was 15%, the number of pods 45%, the number of seeds 58% and the weight of seeds 49% less than the weed-free control plots the same crop elements. Weeds were also significantly present in the plots treated only with pre-emergence treatment in the second half of the growing season, so the number of shoots per unit area was 3 %, the number of pods 23 %, the number of seeds 34% and the seed weight 35 % lower, as on weed-free plots. In the case of herbicide treatments, the decrease in yield elements was much smaller: the number of plants per unit area by 1%, the number of shoots by 3–10%, the number of pods by 5–12%, the number of seeds by 13–18%, the seed weight was by 1–5% less than on mechanically weed-controlled plots. Conclusions. Our two-year weed survey results show that the later sowing time of chickpeas favored warm-loving weeds. This is in complete agreement with the opinion of Nagy (2017), who found that sowing time determines the predominant weed species in a given area. At the same time, the statement of Kurnik (1970) was not confirmed, since in our experiment we proved in the case of ʻRealeʼ cultivar that the later sowing stock in 2018 gave higher yields than the plots with earlier sowing time in 2019. The changing weather caused by climate change makes the site characteristics of the given period much more unpredictable, so the yield is determined much more by the field factors developed during the growing season than by the calendar period.