Impact of Foliar with Nano silica in Mitigation of Salt Stress on Some Soil Properties, Crop Water Productivity and Anatomical Structure of Maize and Faba Bean
IMPROVING soil productivity, enhancing nutrition use efficiency, and protecting plants from environmental stress, can be ascertained by nanofertilizers. Lysimeter experiments were conducted at Sakha Agriculture Research Station Farm during two successive summer 2017 and winter 2018 growing seasons to study the effect of foliar application with different concentrations with nano silica and different salinity of irrigation water on some soil properties and productivity of maize and faba bean plants. For soil properties, results showed that there are no variations between soil salinity and foliar application with different concentrations with nano silica. But, there is a remarkable variation in mean of soil salinity between irrigation with fresh water and blended with well water treatments, which T4 (1.36 dS m 1) recorded 4.32 and 4.47 dS m 1, compared with T2 (2.45 dS m 1) recorded 5.07 and 5.28 dS m 1, at 0 20 cm depth for maize and faba bean plants, respectively. Also, the mean values of Exchangeable sodium percent after harvesting of maize was 12.55, 14.97, 14.72 and 13.85 with different irrigation water treatments T1 (0.51 dS m 1) T2 (2.45 dS m 1) T3 (1.84 dS m 1) and T4 (1.36 dS m 1) respectively, at 0 20 cm depth. The same trend was exhibited by faba bean plants. Anatomical structure in roots of maize and faba bean plants recorded increment (22.75% and 15.54% with 300 mg L 1 nano Si more than the control. Also, all of the anatomical characters of roots were decreased by increasing of the salinity irrigation water and recorded lowest values up to T2 (2.45 dS m 1) and without nano Si. Treatment T2 showed a significant reduction in grain yield (39.28 and 80.13 and in straw yield (38.84 and 78.06% for maize and faba bean plants, respectively, in comparison with the control treatment, T1. On the other hand, T4 recorded the highest values 4.22 and 5.32 Mg Fed. 1 in grain and straw yield of maize plants and 1.74 and 1.84 Mg fed 1 in grain and straw yield of faba bean plants, respectively, under foliar application with 300 mg L 1 of nano silica compared with other concentrations. The same trend was observed in chlorophyll content, nitrogen uptake and nitrogen use efficiency of maize and faba bean. Based on these results, foliar application with 300 mg L 1 of nano silica is the proper concentration to mitigate the salt stress for maize and faba bean plants.