Agricultural Science Digest

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Agricultural Science Digest, volume 42 issue 3 (june 2022) : 312-316

Effect of INM Practices on the Leaves Parameters of Terminalia tomentosa Food Plant of Antheraea mylitta Drury

Soma Karmakar1,*, A.K. Srivastava1, T. Pandiaraj2, Jyostna Tirkey3
1Department of Botany, Ranchi University, Ranchi-834 008, Jharkhand, India.
2Narendra Deva University of Agricultural Technology, Azamgarh-276 207, Uttar Pradesh, India.
3Central Muga Eri Research and Training Institute, Jorhat-785 700, Assam, India.
Cite article:- Karmakar Soma, Srivastava A.K., Pandiaraj T., Tirkey Jyostna (2022). Effect of INM Practices on the Leaves Parameters of Terminalia tomentosa Food Plant of Antheraea mylitta Drury . Agricultural Science Digest. 42(3): 312-316. doi: 10.18805/ag.D-5441.

Background: Terminalia tomentosa is a primary food plant of Antheraea mylitta Drury a polyphagous insect of Saturniidae family which is exploited commercially for the production of silk. Good quality of silk production depend on the nutrient of leaf. So, to optimize the nutrient of leaf integrated nutrient management practices has been used to increase soil fertility and to supply plant nutrient at an optimum.

Methods: In order to evaluate the effect of INM practices on the leaves parameters of Terminalia tomentosa food plant of Antheraea mylitta Drury. An experiment based on randomised complete block design with 21 treatments and three replication was conducted at Central Tasar Research and Training Institute, Nagri, Ranchi in the year 2019-20.

Result: Results revealed that the application of INM treatments are significant on various leaf parameters. Highest single leaf length and breadth mean was observed in T19 (23.29 cm; 11.96 cm) was applied with 75% RDF through fertilizer+25% through vermicompost+ Azotobacter + PSB, weight of single leaf was found to be highest in T13 (5.19 g). The number of leaf was recorded highest in T19 (1892). The fresh leave yield ranged from 1617.317-5208.224 g with average mean of 4085.72 g, T19 (5032.1 g) recorded the highest fresh leaf yield. The dry matter content was found highest in T19 (340.56 g). The moisture content was recorded higher in T4 (71%) followed by T15 (69%).

Antheraea mylitta the wild silkworm which is commercially exploited for the production of Vanya silk (Bambhaniya et al., 2017) is a polyphagous insect and feeds on mainly three primary and dozens of secondary host plant (Suryanarayana et al., 2005). Tussar silk in sanskrit is known as “Kosa Silk” (Nakpathom et al., 2009; Pilanee Vaithanomsat et al., 2008) and is valued for its rich texture and natural deep gold colour (Vigneswaran et al., 2015). The tribes and people of weaker section residing in the hilly areas practices this culture since ancient time (Chakraborty, 2018) for their livelihood. The silkworm’s silk gland produces the silk fibre which is a protein mainly consist of fibroin and sericin. The fibroin is coated by a double filament gum called sericin. Sericin helps in the formation of silk cocoon because it acts as a binder which maintains the structural integrity (Patel and Modasiya, 2011, Takeda, 2009). The silk obtained post-cocoon processing depend upon the nutritional contents of leaves (Sinha et al., 2002), indicating the importance of leaf quality in the success of Tasar crops (Sahey et al., 2001). The foliage quality depend upon judicious management of inputs such as water, micro and macro-nutrients (Sahay and Kapila, 1993). Sufficient amount of balanced nutrients are made available by using organic resources like green manure, vermicomposts, biofertilizer and vermibed/ vermiwash as biopesticides having some antibiotic property and which helps in overcoming nutritional depletion (Zambare et al., 2008 and Subsashri, 2004). Fertilization with organic manure enhance the SOC, increase the concentration of nutrients like N, P, K and improves the yield and also influence the microbial biodiversity (Pratibha and Shachi, 2016) and also increases the total microbial community than those treated with chemical fertilizers (Islam et al., 2009). SOM provide 90% of plant available N, 80% of plant available P and 50% of plant available S as well as micronutrients (Duxbury et al., 1989). Nitrogen, Phosphorus and Potassium are considered primary nutrient as required in large quantities by plant than the rest of the nutrients (Hodges, 1995). Integrated nutrient management along with chemical fertilizers, organic manures and biofertilizers are found to maintain soil fertility and also reduce the cost of cultivation for sustaining increased productivity, an integrated manner is suitable for each farming situation in its ecological, social and economical conditions for a longer time. The present investigation was carried out to study the effect of INM practices on the leaf parameters.
The present study was carried out in the field of Central Tasar Research and Training Institute, Nagri, Ranchi in the year 2019-20 to determine the influence of inorganic, organic and biofertilizer on Leaf parameters of host plant of Tasar Silkworm (Antheraea mylitta Drury). Twenty different combination with three replication were laid out in randomized complete block design (Table 1).
 

Table 1: Treatment details.


 
Sample collection and processing
 
Leaf sample were collected from each treatments for further analysis.
 
Morphological parameters (Mallapa, 2015)
 
Length and breadth of leaf (cm)
 
Length and breadth of leaf were measured from each treatment.
 
Weight of single leaf (g)
 
Weight of single leaf from each treatment were recorded.
 
Number of leaves plant-1
 
Total number of leaves per treatment were counted.
 
Leaf yield (g plant-1)
 
Leaf yield per plant was recorded on fresh weight basis in grams.
 
Dry matter production of leaf (g plant-1)
 
Leaves of each treatment were collected randomly and were air dried followed by oven drying 60°C to a constant weight and expressed in grams.
 
Physiological parameters
 
Moisture content (%)
 
Fresh leaves were harvested from each treatment and weighed in electronic balance to note the fresh leaf weight.  Then, the leaves were oven dried at 70°C for 48 hours and the dry weight was recorded and expressed on fresh weight basis (Gravimetric Method). The leaf moisture content was calculated as per the standard of A.O.A.C (1970).
 
 
               
Statistical analysis
 
Statistical analysis was carried out using ANOVA and SPSS 20.0 and duncan’s multiple range test (DMRT) was used to determine significance of the difference between individuals means (Gomez and Gomez,1984).
Morphological and yield parameters
 
The leaf parameters were found to be significant in different treatment with inorganic, organic and biofertilizer due to slow and steady release of nutrients in addition to supply of important macro and micro-nutrients besides supply of N and P by nitrogen fixing bacteria and phosphorus solubilizing bio-inoculants respectively (Khan and Pariari, 2012; Rashmi et al., 2006 and Mallapa et al., 2016). The length and breadth of single leaf increased after the application of different treatment. Highest mean of single leaf length was recorded in T19 (23.29 cm) was applied with 75% RDF through fertilizer + 25% through vermicompost + Azotobacter + PSB. The breadth was recorded highest in T19 (11.96 cm) over the control. Weight of single leaf was recorded highest in T13 (5.19 g) and lowest was recorded in T15 (2.64 g). The highest number of leaves was recorded in T19 (1892) was applied with 75% RDF through fertilizer + 25% through vermicompost + Azotobacter+PSB was followed by T15 (1704). Increase in number of leaves per plant, average leaf length, leaf width, plant girth was reported by Chaudhuri et al., (2016). Increase in leaf number per plant was reported by Singh et al., (2012) and Mallapa et al., (2016). Leaf weight indicates the size of photosynthetic system (Adhikari, 2009). Leaf weight is directly related to the level of N applied (Puskarnath, 1976 and Taya et al., 1994). The fresh leave yield ranged from 1617.317-5208.224 g with an average mean of 4085.72 g. The highest leaf yield was recorded in T19 was treated with 75% RDF through fertilizer + 25% through vermicompost + Azotobacter + PSB. Fresh leaf yield was reported Mallapa et al., (2016); Chakraborty, (2018) and Ram, (2017) and increments in leaf yield in Terminalia tomentosa was also reported by Singhvi, 2014. Increase in leaf yield using biofertilizer and INM was observed by Nambiar and Abrol, (1992) and Anil Kumar and Johan, (1999). Increase in yield is due to improving plant growth and accumulation of high amounts of sugar which play effective role for cell division and increase in total yield of plant (Waleed and Iman, 2017) (Table 2).
 

Table 2: Effect of INM practices on leaf quality parameters.


       
The dry matter content of leaf was found highest in T19 (340.56 g) which was applied with 75% RDF through fertilizer +25% through vermicompost+ Azotobacter+PSB and was as per with T20 (333.27 g). Increase in dry matter production was reported by Sajan et al., (2002) (Table 3).
 

Table 3: Dry matter content (g plant-1) of Terminalia tomentosa influenced by INM practices.


 
Physiological characters
 
The moisture content was recorded higher in T4 (71%) followed by T15 (69%) and T6, T10 (67%). Increase in leaf moisture content was reported by Chowdhury et al., (2009); Sujathamma et al., (2014) and Ram, 2017. The beneficial effect of organic resources result in improvements of growth attributes, leaf yield and quality due to proper decomposition, mineralization of solubilizing effects and availability of sufficient nutrients. This was corroborated with the findings of Das et al., (1990); Sudhakar et al., (2000) and Setua et al., (2007) (Table 4).
       

Table 4: Influence of INM practices on moisture (%) of Terminalia tomentosa.


 
Combined application of chemical fertilizer and organic fertilizers mitigate the deficiency of many secondary and micronutrients (Sujathamma et al., 2014) and biofertilizer application improves the growth and yield parameters by enhancing the uptake of nutrient by plants (Borea,1991). Azotobacter and Azospirillium aid in increased growth due to their nitrogen fixing capacity and also produced growth promoting substances like IAA and GA (Jackson and Brown 1966). PSB was able to solubilise the insoluble form of phosphorus and make it easily available to plants (Sajan et al., 2002).
The INM practices was found to effect significantly different parameters of leaf and also increased the leaf yield. The inorganic fertilizer is costly and also has hazardous effect on the environment and health hazard to human. On the other hand biofertilizer are cost-effective and non-toxic. Combined application of organic manure along with inorganic and biofertilizer improves nutrient efficiency, protect nutrient from lose and cause less degradation to soil and environment.
The authors are highly thankful to the Director of Central Tasar Research and Training Institute for providing the lab facility and the Head of University, Department of Botany, Ranchi University, Ranchi for constant support and guidance.

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