Judul: Water use efficiency on upland sugar cane
Abstrak: Low Indonesian sugar production is mainly due to low productivity and low sugar yield. The shift of sugarcane crop acreage from low land to upland was the major factor of low productivity. Cultivation of sugarcane in uplands faced many constraints, namely low availaibility of soil water, low soil nutrient and unavailability of appropriate varieties. Cane cultivation in upland is commonly done at the beginning of the wet season (in November) in order to avoid the plant from water stress at the beginning of growth period. This causes the sugarcane age of only 7 months and have not reach maturity at harvest time in June which leads to lower sugarcane productivity. Shifting planting season is an alternative that can be done to obtain plants with sufficient maturity at the harvest time. However, the consequences of shifting the planting season is that the planting occured on dry season and which means that watering is needed. The limited availability of water demands efficiency in water usage. The application of organic matter as filter cake compost is expected to reduce the frequency of irrigation. This aims of this study are (1) to study the effect of water supply on performance of several varieties of sugarcane, (2) to study the effect of filter cake compost on nutrient uptake by sugarcane at various irrigation levels, (3) to analyze the efficiency of water usage in connection with the provision of filter cake compost in some varieties of sugarcane, and (4) to develop recommendation of water supply efficiency in the field with the addition of filter cake compost. The study was conducted in three stages of the experiment, which were the performance of several varieties under water stress, the effect of filter cake compost and irrigation on plant nutrient uptake, and the application of filter cake compost and frequency of irrigation on upland sugar cane productivity. The sugarcane varieties used in the experiments of performance varieties under different moisture content were PS 851, PS 864, PS 862, PS 921, PS 951, PS 91-787 and BL. After 3 months observation, it appears that water stress began significantly affected plant growth at 50% of field capacity (FC). The results showed that seven varieties were able to grow well under soil water content up to 75% FC. Based on Drought Tolerance Index, varieties BL and PS 864 has DTI values close to tolerant, while others were considered as moderate tolerant. Although the DTI value of PS 921 was only classified as moderately tolerant, it has the highest biomass in all of the soil water content treatments. It shows that PS 921 has the highest potential among the other varieties as variety of sugarcane suitable for upland planting. To study the effect of filter cake compost and water supply on the nutrient uptake of sugarcane, the variety PS 921 was used. The dose of filter cake compost were 0, 5, 10, 15, and 20 tons per hectare and the soil water content were 100%, 75% and 50% FC, respectively. The results of this experiments show that the uptake of P by sugarcane was influenced
Keyword: Water use efficiency, Saccharum officinarum L., Saccharrum robustum L.