Effect of Seed Treatment and Nutrient Schedule on the Productivity of Blackgram (Vigna mungo L.)

Background: Blackgram (Vigna mungo L.) is an important short duration crop and is grown throughout the country. Seed treatment can improve seedling establishment and better crop stand; it also improves plants ability to tolerate stress at early growth stages and foliar application has the advantage of quick and efficient utilization of nutrients, elimination of nutrient losses through leaching and fixation in soil and also helps in regulating the uptake of nutrients by plants thus improving productivity.
Methods: A field experiment was conducted during rabi 2018 at the Instructional Farm, College of Agriculture, Vellayani, Thiruvananthapuram to assess the effect of different levels of seed treatments and nutrient schedule on the growth and yield of blackgram. The growth attributes, yield attributes and yield viz., number of pods per plant, seeds per pod, length of pod, 100 seed weight, grain yield, haulm yield and harvest index were favorably influenced by the treatments.
Result: Seed treatment with borax @ 1 g kg^-1 seed and sodium molybdate @ 1 g kg^-1 seed were observed superior in increasing plant height (135.84 cm), number of trifoliate leaves per plant (7.61), pods per plant (24.16), length of pod (5.23 cm), 100 seed weight (6.74 g), grain yield (1005 kg ha^-1) and harvest index (0.38). Significantly higher nodule number (41.83), effective nodule number (33.83) and weight of nodules (58.83 mg) plant^-1 at flowering were documented with sodium molybdate @ 1 g kg^-1 seed. In case of seeds per pod significantly higher number of pods per plant (7.33) was observed with borax @ 2 g kg^-1 seed and maximum haulm yield (1854 kg ha^-1) reported with sodium molybdate @ 1 g kg^-1 seed. The basal application of ½ N + full P + ½ K followed by ½ N and ½ K as foliar spray of 13:0:45 at 15, 30, 45 and 60 DAS produced significantly more 100 seed weight (6.52 g), grain yield (872 kg ha^-1) and haulm yield (1750 kg ha^-1). Interaction effect of boron and molybdenum also showed significant influence with respect to yield attributes and yield.