Pemanfaatan SWA (super water absorbent) Pati Singkong untuk Meningkatkan Ketersediaan Air pada Tanaman Jagung (zea mays) di Tanah Bertekstur Liat

Abstract

Water shortage for plant growth is one of the most problem in dry-land system agriculture. An attempt that can overcome this problem is application of water absorbent that can absorb amount water and increasing water supply for plant growth. SWA (Super Water Absorbent) cassava starch can be a choice for this purpose. This study was aimed to assess the effect of SWA cassava starch and its comparison to the other water absorbent, for corn plant growth in clay-textured soil (podsolik). The experiment applied Randomized Completely Design, and the treatment is irrigation ratio: each three days, each seven days and each fourteen days. The results showed that the use of SWA cassava-starch on each-fourteen-days-irrigation-ratio was significantly different on corn plant growth. Although this treatment gave a good result, but generally this treatment did not give a better result than each-three-days-irrigation ratio.