EFFECTS OF PLANTING GEOMETRY ON SEED YIELD AND QUALITY IN FINGER MILLET (Eleusine coracana L. Gaertn)
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Date
2018-08-01
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University of Agricultural Sciences, Bangalore
Abstract
Finger millet (Eleusine coracana (L.) Gaertn) is a staple food crop grown by subsistence farmers in the semi-arid tropics and sub-tropics of the world under rainfed conditions. Finger millet is a profuse tillering crop that requires optimum spacing for proper utilisation of light and plant nutrition to express its seed yield potential. Considering the crop characteristics and the need of quality seeds and maximum seed
yield for the subsistence farmers, a field experiment was carried out to study the effects of planting geometry on seed yield and quality in finger millet (Eleusine coracana L. Gaertn) at J-Block, NSP, GKVK, UAS, Bengaluru during kharif 2017. The treatments were arranged in Randomized Complete Block Design (RCBD) with four replications, each replicate consisting of six different planting geometry viz., Rectangular method at 20 x 10 cm (G1) solid row, Rectangular method at 20 x 20 cm (G2) paired row, Square method at 20 x 20 cm (G3), Square method at 30 x 30 cm (G4), Square method at 45 x 45
cm (G5) and Square method at 60 x 60 cm (G6). The results indicated that planting geometry treatment (G2) rectangular method @ 20 x 20 cm paired row recorded maximum seed yield per hectare (55.64 q/ha). This is mainly due to maintenance of optimum plant population per unit area. While yield attributing characters like number of tiller per hill (7.68), number of fingers per ear head (7.30) and seed yield per plant (65.75 g) were significantly maximum in square method at 60 x 60 cm (G6). This may be due to efficient utilization of resources as the individual plant got more area for absorption of plant nutrients and more light and air for better development of growth characters (Ram et. al., 2013.) Hence, the study could be concluded that rectangular method at 20 x 20 cm paired row plant geometry was found to be suitable for increasing the seed productivity of finger millet