The effect of sowing date and harvesting time on quantitative traits and yield of silage maize under Varamin environmental conditions

Usually sowing date and harvest time of summer crops such as maize have a significant impact on the quantitative and qualitative yield of the crop. Therefore, the aim of this study was to investigate the effect of sowing date and harvest time on quantitative traits and yield of silage maize (single cross 701; cv. Karun), this experiment was done as a split plot based on completely randomized blocks design with three replications in Varamin at year of 2015. Treatments included five sowing dates as main factor (9th of April, 21th of May, 18th of June, 30th of June and 15th of July) and two harvesting times as sub-factor (grain milky stage and grain dough stage). The results showed that the effect of sowing date had significant effect at 1% level on the stem fresh weight, maize fresh weight, total fresh weight, stem fresh weight to total fresh weight ratio, maize fresh weight to total fresh weight ratio and fresh forage yield and significant effect at 5% level on the leaf fresh weight to total fresh weight ratio. Based on the findings sowing date of 30th of June has more fresh weight of leaf, stem and ear and more fresh forage than other sowing dates. Harvesting time in milking stage has better quality and harvesting at dough stage has higher quantity of product. Correlation between studied traits showed positive and high effect of stem fresh weight with forage yield. In general, it can be stated that summer sowing dates, especially 30th of June and harvest time at the dough stage are the most favorable times for silage corn cultivation in the Varamin region.