Tips in Planting Hybrid Rice

Here are a few helpful tips in planting hybrid rice:

1.     Seed and Seedbed preparation - for every 2 kg of seeds, prepare 40 m2 seedbed. Each bed must be about 1m wide, of any length, and raised to a height of 4 to 5 cm. Soak the seeds for about 12 to 24 hours in clean water until these have swelled. Some seeds will float. Do not remove them. Change the water every 5 to 6 hours. Then drain the water and incubate them for 24 to 36 hours until a white dot comes out from the seeds. After preparing the seedbed, apply 1 to 1.5 bags of organic materials for every 40 m2 seedbed. Once the seedbed is prepared, sow 20 kg of pre-germinated hybrid seeds at a rate of 50g for every square meter.

2.     Transplanting - this method only requires 20 kg of hybrid rice seeds per hectare. Transplant 21 to 25 day-old seedlings at 1 to 2 seedings/hill. Plant at a distance of 20 cm x 20 cm during wet season. Replant missing hills within 7 days after transplanting.

3.     Irrigation - maintain soil saturation within 1 week after transplanting. Gradually raise the water level to about 2 to 3 cm at tillering stage. Later, achieve 3 to 5 cm water depth every irrigation time until 1 to 2 weeks before harvest. Drain standing water(if any) 1 week before the expected harvest for easy harvesting and grain quality preservation.

4.     Fertilizer application - for basal, apply 4 to 6 bags of 14-14-14 depending on the results of soil analysis or minus one element technique. If K is deficient in a sandy loam soil, apply half bag of muriate of potash (0-0-60) at panicle initiation. If both N and K are needed at panicle initiation, apply 2 bags of 17-0-17 per hectare. Otherwise, apply N and K fertilizer separately. Spray 0-0-60 for three times starting at 50% heading then every other day at a rate of 2 kg/ha per tank load of knapsack. Twelve tank loads of knapsack sprayer will be used in a hectare of ricefield. A total of 6 kg 0-0-60 will be used for the entire spraying time.

5.     Harvesting - harvest the crop when 80 to 85% of the grains are clear, firm and straw-colored even if the rest are still in hard dough stage.