Effect of organic growing media for cost effective production of quality tomato seedlings in portrays under naturally ventilated polyhouse
2021
Nārāʼin Rāj, | Debnath, Sovan | Anil Kumar, | Kishor, Arun | Sharma, O.C.
Experiments were laid out with ten treatments in a randomized block design (RBD) with three replications for standardizing the growing media for seedling production of tomato cv. VL-4 in protrays. The treatments included different locally available organic growing media such as, soil, FYM, vermicompost and forest litter alone or in combination in equal proportion. Results revealed that, all the traits under study except number of leaves per seedling exhibited significant (P>0.05) differences for various treatments. However, treatments responded differently for various traits. The maximum seedling length of 25.33cm and 22.63cm were recorded in the treatment combination of FYM+Forest Litter and Forest Litter as well as Soil+FYM+Vermicompost+Forest Litter, in the year 2016 and 2017, respectively with the mean length over the year of 23.83cm in treatment Forest Litter and also in Soil+FYM+Vermicompost+Forest Litter. Highest mean fresh and dry weight of seedling as well as maximum number of secondary roots per seedling were recorded with the soil+vermicompost growing media (7.37, 1.00g and 43.67 number, respectively). The net returns for seedling production from 200m² was highest (Rs. 154695.68) in vermicompost media followed by (Rs. 144484.16) in FYM+ Forest Litter media. However, the benefit cost ratio was highest (7.97) in case of FYM+ Forest Litter. Most of seedling parameters showed superiority while raising tomato seedlings in organic substrate alone or in combination with and without soil over sole soil medium. Hence, admixture of organic medium with and without soil in equal proportion may be beneficial for raising the tomato seedlings with improved germination and subsequent growth compared to soil media alone.
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