Effect of Potassium Fertilizer with Piriformospora indica and Pantoea ananatis on Yield, Yield Components and Potassium Uptake of Rice (cv. ‘Tarom Mahalli’)

Rice is an important cereal in the diet of many people in the world and Iran. An overuse of chemical fertilizers in rice fields also causes environmental problems so that the use of biofertilizers as an appropriate alternative is important for producing healthy crops and reducing environmental hazards. Therefore, in order to evaluation of the effect of Pantoea ananatis and Piriformospora indica on yield, yield components and potassium uptake of rice(cv. ‘Tarom Mahalli’), a field experiment was carried out in Joybar city in 2016. The experiment was conducted in a split plot arrangement based on randomized complete block design with three replications. Four levels of potassium sulfate fertilizer (PSF: 0, 60, 120 and 180 kg.ha-1) were used as the main plot and four levels of inoculation (non-inoculation as control, rice root seedling inoculation with P. ananatis and P. indica, separately, and co-inoculation treatment) served as the sub-plots. The results indicated that all studied traits such as panicle number per hill (PN), panicle length (PL), number of filled (NFG) and empty (NEG) grain per panicle, paddy yield (PY), biological yield (BY), harvest index (HI) and potassium uptake (PU) in the grain of rice were significantly affected by PSF and various inoculation treatments and also the interaction effect between them were statistically significant in more studied traits. Co-inoculation treatment significantly increased PN, PL, NFG, PY, BY, HI and PU by 4.52, 4.65, 15.7, 19.4, 6.85, 11.7 and 22.1 percentage, respectively, and the NEG was decreased by 41.8 percentage as compared to the control. Furthermore, values of all studied traits increased with the addition of PSF from zero to 180 kg.ha-1, except for NEG. According to the results of regression analysis, consequently, the co-inoculation treatment as the best, reduced the application of PSF ~55.5 kg.ha-1 (about 40%) and increased PY ~790 kg.ha-1 (about 18.6%), compared to the control which can be used in the sustainable rice system production as well as.