Normal water irrigation as an alternative to effluent irrigation in improving rice grain yield and properties of a paper mill effluent affected soil.

Rice crop (var. Luit) was grown under controlled conditions in paper mill effluent contaminated soil and irrigated with undiluted paper mill effluent as well as normal water and compared the results against a control treatment consisting of similar unaffected soil irrigated with normal water. The effluent was alkaline (pH 7.5), containing high soluble salts (EC 2.93 dS m(-1)), chloride (600 mg L(-1)) and total dissolved solids (1875 mg L(-1)). At maximum tillering (MT) stage effluent irrigation significantly (P < 0.05) reduced the leaf numbers per hill and leaf area by 19.8 and 36.4 %, respectively. Tiller number and maximum root length were reduced by 19.3% and 12.5%, respectively at fifty percent flowering (FF) stage. Effluent irrigated crop recorded significant reduction in the dry matter production (17.5-24.9%) and grain yield (19%). Unfilled grain was increased by 10.7%. Higher concentration of sodium, calcium and magnesium in the effluent irrigated soil affected K uptake. Available soil P was lowest while available N, K, S and exchangeable and water soluble Na, K, Ca, Mg were highest in effluent irrigated soil. Chloride content found to increase (3-7 folds) while microbial biomass carbon reduced (10-37%). The adverse effect of the paper mill effluent on the crop as well as on the affected soil could be reduced significantly through normal water irrigation.