Improved sugarcane productivity with tillage and trash management practices in semi arid tropical agro ecosystem in India

• Different tillage and trash management practices were tested for ratoon sugarcane.
• Tillage by tractor (TT) and trash shredding (S4) improved ratoon yield and quality.
• Soil physico chemical and biological properties were highly influenced by the same.
• Organic carbon, microbial biomass carbon and mycorrhizal fungi were improved.
• Tillage with trash management practices improve the profitability to the farmers.

Sugarcane productivity at the farm level has been stagnant in India, at around 54–72 t ha−1. One of the main reasons for this low productivity is the yield gap between ratoon and plant cane yield. To improve the ratoon yield and bridge the yield gap, a field experiment was conducted for two seasons with different tillage systems and trash management practices. The treatments in main plots were T1—tillage by tractor drawn off barring (TT), T2—conventional tillage by the bullock drawn country plough (CT) and T3—no tillage (NT) along with seven types of trash management practices (viz., mulching, shredding combined with micro organisms etc.) as sub plots. The results revealed that Tillage by Tractor drawn off barring, (TT) combined with adoption of trash shredding + composted pressmud + wonder life (S4) treatment significantly improved the germination percentage, tiller number, number of millable canes and ultimately the ratoon cane yield in both the seasons. Similarly, soil physical parameters such as bulk density, mean weight diameter, water stable aggregates, soil moisture content were also significantly influenced by the above treatment when compared to control. Besides, root weight of cane, quality parameters of cane juice, soil available N and P, organic carbon, microbial biomass carbon and arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) population also were significantly improved by the adoption of tillage and trash management practices. The results suggest that the tillage with adoption of trash management practices assisted in improving the profitability by way of higher sugarcane ratoon productivity and also in sustaining the soil fertility.