Fungicidal and micronutrients invigoration of groundnut for disease control and yield improvement in Pothowar, Pakistan
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Abstract
Seed treatment with fungicides and micronutrients provides an opportunity to control various seed borne diseases and boosts the yield of many crops in a cost effective and better way as compared to the foliar application. Thus, an experiment was conducted to explore the effects of fungicidal and micronutrients seed treatment on groundnut crop at the Research Farm of PMAS-Arid Agriculture University, Rawalpindi (Pothowar Pleatue) Punjab, Pakistan during the kharif season 2016. Groundnut variety BARI-2011 was subjected to 12 different treatments i.e. control, zinc (1% solution in distilled water), boron (0.1% solution in distilled water), Radomil gold @ 2.5 g, Topsim-M @ 2.5 g, Puslaan @ 3 g (all in 1 litre of distilled water), and the combinations of both micronutrients with 3 fungicides at same concentrations. A randomized complete block design (RCBD) with 2 factors factorial arrangement having 3 replications was implemented in the field. Results indicated that seed treatment with the combination of 1% zinc and Radomil gold @ 2.5 g/litre solution in water resulted in the maximum plant height (45.89 cm), number of pods per plant (50 Nos.), 100 kernel weight (64.39 g), kernel weight (1908 kg/ha), pod yield (2778 kg/ha), biological yield (4590 kg/ha), harvest index (41.56%), shelling percentage (68.69%). Moreover, the crop was least infected by the seed borne diseases (3.27%). These results suggest that seed treatment with the combination of 1% zinc and 2.5 g/litre of Radomil gold had effectively controlled the seed borne diseases as well as boosted the yield of groundnut by improving the yield components.
Keywords: Zinc; Radomil gold; Disease percentage; Yield components