Vol. 11, Issue 2 (2022)

Author(s):
Rahul Dongre, SK Pandey, Reena Nair, AS Gontia and RB Singh

Abstract:
Nutrients play an essential role for growth and development of crops. Among all the essential nutrients Micro-nutrients particularly Zinc, Boron and Secondary nutrient i.e. Calcium play a vital role in growth, development, fruits retention and quality of guava fruits. Zinc is essential for auxin and protein synthesis and responsible for proper maturity of fruit, hence Zinc increases fruit growth as well as fruit yield and overall productivity while boron has a key role in cell division and elongation, thus it positively affecting in fruit weight. Nutrients to the plant can be made available by the basal as well as by the foliar applications. Foliar spray of nutrients has several advantageous in terms of low application rate and high efficiency, uniform distribution of fertilizer material and quick response to applied nutrients (Umer et al., 1999; Mishra et al., 2003; Kumar et al. 2015). Foliar feeding has been found to be 10 to 20 times more effective than soil application (Zaman and Schumann, 2006). The present investigation was conducted at Fruit Research Station, Imalia, Department of Horticulture, Jawaharlal Nehru Krishi Vishwa Vidyalaya, Jabalpur, (M.P.) during 2020-21. The investigation was conducted on 8 years old guava plants (Variety L49) in Randomized Block Design with four replications. The studies was carried out 7 treatments includes T₁ (Control), T₂ (0.2% Borax), T₃ (0.4% Borax), T₄ (0.2% Zinc sulphate₎, T₅ (0.4% Zinc sulphate), T₆ (1% Calcium Chloride₎ and T₇ (1.5% Calcium Chloride). Observation were recoded different yield parameters includes, fruit set (%), fruit retention (%), yield/ plant (kg), fruit length (cm), fruit width (cm), fruit volume, fruit weight (g) and economics of the treatments. Results obtained in the present investigation it is concluded that foliar spray of 0.4% Boron found most suitable in terms of maximum fruit set (80.43%), fruit retention (76.19%). Zinc Sulphate found best in term of yield/ plant (20.57kg), fruit length (7.08 cm), width (7.36 cm), fruit volume (234.19 cm³) and weight (228.59 g). Meanwhile on the basis of economic analysis, 0.4% Zinc sulphate was found to be most economically beneficial with the maximum gross return (Rs. 508230 ha^-1), net return (Rs. 360337 ha^-1) and B.C. ratio (3.44).