Effect and Efficiency of Municipal Solid Waste Compost and Vermicompost on Morpho-Physiological Properties and Yield of Canola under Drought Stress Conditions

In order to study the effect and efficiency of municipal solid waste compost and vermicompost on morpho-physiological properties and yield of canola under drought stress conditions, an experiment was conducted as factorial arrangement based on randomized complete block design with four replications. Treatments consisted of three levels of irrigation, including: normal irrigation (0.75 FC), mild stress (0.55 FC) and severe stress (0.35 FC), and biofertilizer combination in five levels including: non-application of biofertilizer (control), application of municipal solid waste compost at two and four percent levels and application of vermicompost at two and four percent. Results showed that the effect of irrigation and biofertilizer levels in all traits was significant. The interaction of irrigation and biofertilizer had significantly affected on all traits except leaf area ratio and plant nitrogen percent. The results of mean comparison indicated that the mild and severe stress significantly reduced growth, nitrogen percentage, SPAD index, leaf relative water content and grain yield of canola compared to normal irrigation. Application of four percent vermicompost was resulted increase growth, biomass and yield of canola under normal irrigation, mild and severe drought stress compared to other biofertilizer treatments, and in generally, the efficiency of vermicompost in increase canola yield was more than waste compost.