The experiment was conducted during six consecutive years of 1998−2004 at six locations of Bangladesh to assess simple functional yield model for the cropping pattern of Mustard-Boro rice-T. aman rice under nutrient management. Models of N, P, K and S for mustard, boro rice and T. aman rice in the cropping pattern showed quadratic polynomial functions with different coefficients of determination. Response of seed yield of mustard to N (R²=0.68 at p=0.05) was found more favourable as compared to P, K and S (R²=0.52-0.56 at p=0.05). Functional relationship of grain yield of boro rice with N, P, K and S was found significant (R²=0.54-0.79 at p=0.05-0.01). Further, functional relationship of grain yield of T.aman with N, P, K and S was observed significant (R²=0.52-0.80 at p=0.05-0.01). Optimum nutrient levels for mustard (123-22-49-26 kg ha^-1 of N-P-K-S), boro rice (145-26-91-21 kg ha^-1 of N-P-K-S) and T.aman rice (136-19-72-15 kg ha^-1 of N-P-K-S) were determined by using the developed models. Again, economic nutrient levels for mustard (118-16-46-25 kg ha^-1 of N-P-K-S), boro rice (140-25-84-21 kg ha^-1 of N-P-K-S) and T.aman rice (131-18-65-15 kg ha^-1 of N-P-K-S) were also predicted by using the developed models. Yield of crops in Mustard-boro rice-T.aman rice cropping pattern can also be predicted against assumed nutrient levels by using the functional models. Overall, the model predictions of mustard, boro rice and T.aman rice yields were reasonable and showed consistency between observed and predicted yield.

View full abstract

Cultivar mixtures have been suggested as a mean to achieve increased crop productivity. By choosing cultivars that complement each other for performance of important traits, mixtures could be formulated to meet specific production requirements. In this paper, mixing ability and inter-genotypic competition from 7×7 mechanical diallel mixtures excluding reciprocals of Mungbean (Vigna radiata L.) were studied, during March to Mid June 2008, at Sher-e-Bangla Agricultural University (SAU) farm under two experimental sets which provided for intrarow and inter row mixing of genotypes in biblend, designated respectively as Set I and Set II, as well as uniblend stand in both sets. The mean performance analysis showed that the genotype BD-6893 has the best performance for most of the vitally important characters such as pods/plant, seeds/plant and yield/plant. In respect of biblend mixture, the biblend BD-6901+BD-6922 was found as the best biblend mixture for different characters. Averaged biblends were 1.35% higher yielding than the mean yield of their uniblend components. For grain yield, performance in biblends was highly correlated with the average of the two component uniblends. The genotype BD-6906 had a good mixing ability for different yield and yield contributing characters as pods/plant, pod length, seeds/pod, yield/plant etc. in the both experimental sets. The mixture (biblend) BD-6901+BD-6922, BD-6893+BD-6901 and BD-6921+BD-6922 were found to be a good specific mixer for different characters. Diallel analysis of mixing ability, analogous to genetic analysis of combining ability, demonstrated that uniblends differed in their ability to determine grain yield in biblends. The ability to predict biblend performance based on uniblend performance, together with the potential for above average grain yield, suggested that biblends can be formulated to achieve specific production requirements.

View full abstract

Performance of ten plantain lines was studied at the Regional Agricultural Research Station, Ishurdi, Pabna during 2009-2010 to select the most suitable lines for cultivations. The plantain (Musa paradisica L.) lines varied widely in respect of yield components and their yield. Pseudostem height ranged from 237.323 cm to 382.00 cm. The line MP-15 produced the heaviest bunch (18.86kg), number of hands (11.33) and fingers (179.33) per bunch as well as yield (47.15t/ha). The overall results indicated that the lines MP-03, MP-07, MP-15, MP-18, MP-24, MP-25 and variety BARI Kala-2 performed well in respect of studied characters under the agroclimatic conditions of Ishurdi, Pabna.

View full abstract

The experiment was carried out at Bangladesh Agricultural University Farm, Mymensingh during aman season of 2008 to reveal the effect of tillage intensity, fertilizer and manuring on yield and yield contributing characters of rice. The experiment consisted of three main plot treatments and four sub-plot treatments. The main plot consists of tillage treatments such as; one passing (P₁), two passings (P₂) and three passings (P₃) of a power tiller. Again the sub plot having fertilizer and manure treatments, characterized as; recommended dose of fertilizer (FM₀), 50% of N plus rest of recommended dose of fertilizers + cowdung @ 5 t ha^-1 (FM₁), 50% of N plus rest of recommended dose of fertilizers + rice straw @ 5 t ha^-1 (FM₂) and 50% of N plus rest of recommended dose of fertilizer + cowdung @ 2.5 t ha^-1 plus rice straw @ 2.5 t ha^-1 (FM₃). Data was collected for plant height, number of tiller/hill, panicle length, number of grains/panicle, 1000 grain weight, grain yield and straw yield. Incase of tillage intensity, most of all the characters but plant height showed significant differences and P₃ was found the best treatment. Regarding fertilizer and manure treatments, there were significant difference among the characters except panicle length and 1000 grain weight and FM₀ demonstrated the best result. Considering all the treatment in to account with special emphasis on yield P₃FM₀ combination was found the best treatment which exhibited the highest number of tiller/hill (13.88), number of grains/panicle (141.41) and grain yield (4.98 t/ha), respectively.

View full abstract

A field experiment was conducted at the Horticulture Farm of Bangladesh Agricultural University, Mymensingh during November, 2003 to March, 2004 to study the influence of cowdung and sulphur on the economic performance and size distribution of potato tuber. Four levels of cowdung viz, 0, 7.5, 15 and 22.5 t/ha and two levels of sulphur viz., 0 and 16.36 kg S/ha were used in the experiment. Almost all the yield parameters of potato were gradually increased with the increasing level of cowdung and sulphur. The yield attributes and yield of potato were increased up to 15 tones cowdung per hectare and declined thereafter. Considering all the treatment in to account with special emphasis on the maximum marketable yield (26.46 t/ha), harvest index (0.76), gross return (Tk. 164.60 thousand/ha), net return (Tk. 103.43 thousand/ha) and BCR (2.69) with highest percentage (72.47%) of medium size tuber (30-50 mm) were obtained when 15 tones of cowdung and 16.36 kg S/ha were applied together.

View full abstract

The experiment was conducted at Regional Agricultural Research Station, Ishurdi, Pabna in Bangladesh during 2009-10 to find out the effect of bio control agent against foot and root rot of cauliflower. Five different forms of two biocontrol agents were tested for their performance against the causal pathogen. All the bio control agents showed significantly better performance over control. The lowest foot and root rot incidence (6.25 %) was recorded in soil amendment with Trichoderma harzianum compost (1.0 t/ha) treated plots and the highest (18.75 %) was recorded in control. The yield ranged from 17.91 to 23.05 t/ha, the highest and lowest yields were recorded in soil amendment with Trichoderma harzianum compost (1.0 t/ha) and untreated control, respectively.

View full abstract

A comparative study of coir pith and cowdung was carried out at Regional Agricultural Research Station, BARI, Jessore in 2008 to show the performance of coir pith on growth and yield of summer tomato compared to cowdung. Five treatment combinations viz. T₁, 10 t/ha coir pith; T₂, 20 t/ha coir pith; T₃, 10 t/ha cowdung; T₄, 20 t/ha cowdung; and T₅, control were included in the study. Growth and yield of summer tomato was significantly influenced by the treatments. Maximum number of fruits per plant (30) was obtained from T₂ treatment which was higher than T₃ treatment (27 and). Similarly the highest single fruit weight (57 g) was measured in T₂ treatment which was higher than T₃ treatment (54 g). The highest marketable yield (32.59 t/ha) was recorded from the treatment T₁ which was statistically similar to T₃ treatment (32.14 t/ha) and the lowest marketable yield (13.31 t/ha) was recorded from control. Threfore, coir pith @ 10 t/ha with chemical fertilizer is suitable for profitable summer tomato production at Jessore region in Bangladesh.

View full abstract

Nineteen hybrid genotypes of pointed gourd were characterized and evaluated their performance were studied at the Regional Agricultural Research Station, Ishurdi, Pabna during the season 2010-2011. The objective of the experiment was to evaluate the nineteen genotypes hybrid in pointed gourd. The genotypes varied significantly in days to germination, vine length, number of shoots, number of node at harvest, days to flowering, vine length, number of shoots and number of node at flowering, wide variation in colour, stripe, shape, curvature of fruits, number of fruits per plant, weight of fruits per plant, pulp weight, number of seed per fruit, weight of seed per fruit and yield. The highest number of fruits (175.0) per plant was obtained from ISDHPG014 while the lowest (103.0) was obtained from ISDHPG002. The highest yield (44.54 t/ha) was obtained by ISDHPG014 while the lowest (18.73 t/ha) was recorded in ISDHPG019 (check). The genotypes ISDHPG008, ISDHPG012, ISDHPG013, ISDHPG016 and ISDHPG018 also showed better performance in respect of yield (34.37-39.60 t/ha).

View full abstract

Genetic divergence among 107 grasspea genotypes was estimated based on the morphological traits using Mahalanobis generalized distance (D2) analysis to group the grasspea genotypes. Significant variations among grasspea genotypes were observed in respect of days to 1st flowering, days to 50% flowering, days to maturity, plant height, number of pods per peduncle, number of pods per plant, number of seeds per plant, 100 seed weight and yield per plant. The first female flower initiation was earlier in BD-5936 (49 days) than the other genotypes. BD-5039 produced significant maximum number of pods per plant (69.00). The highest grain yield per plant (40.88 g) was recorded from entry BD-5363 genotype while the lowest (7.4 g) was in BD-4921 genotype. A total of 74.66 % variation was observed from PCA against first six eigen values while only first two values were responsible for the variation at 38.42%. Considering the mean values, the genotypes were grouped into ten clusters. The highest number of genotypes (21) was belonging to cluster V and lowest (5) belonging to cluster III. The highest mean values for days to maturity (123.9), pod width (66.3 cm), number of seeds per pod (5.03), number of seeds per plant (333.4) and seed yield per plant (25.0 g) were found in cluster VI. The highest mean values for plant height (96.6 cm) and pod length (1.13 cm) were found in cluster VII. Among them, the highest inter-cluster distance was obtained between the cluster III and VI (27.32) followed by VI and VIII (24.07) while the lowest was between I and II (0.81) followed by cluster. The intra-cluster distance was highest (0.58) in cluster IX. The maximum value of inter-cluster distance indicated that genotypes belonging to cluster III were far diverged from those of cluster VI.

View full abstract

The experiments were conducted in the seedbed of Soil Science Division, Bangladesh Agricultural Research Institute, Joydebpur, Gazipur, Bangladesh to find out the effect of rate of arbuscular mycorrhiza (AM) inoculum in producing cabbage seedlings during winter season of 2007-08 and 2008-09. Seven rates of AM inoculum viz., 0, 0.5, 1.0, 1.5, 2.0, 2.5, 3.0 kg/m were used for cabbage seedling production. Cowdung at the rate of 5 kg/m were used as the basal. Cabbage seeds were sown in 10 cm apart solid lines on 13 November 2007 and 11 November 2008, and the seedlings were thinned out to about 3 cm from seedling to seedling within a week of germination. Cultivar Atlas-70 was used as the variety of cabbage. Biomass yield, seedling height and nutrient uptake by cabbage seedlings increased greatly with the use of AM inoculum. Biomass yield of cabbage seedlings were followed quadratic trend with the increase of AM inoculum rate from 0 to 1.5 kg/m in 2007-08 and 2.0 kg/m in 2008-09.

View full abstract

The experiment was conducted in the Laboratory, Department of Plant Pathology Bangladesh Agricultural University (BAU), Mymensingh, Bangladesh during the period of 2000–2003 to investigate the growth habit, conidial and sclerotial characters of foot and root rot pathogenic fungi of pulses. Among all the isolates of Fusarium species, the radial mycelial growth ranged from 34.7–72.5 mm and 66.3–90.0 mm at 7 and 15 days after inoculation (DAI), respectively. Colony colours of Fusarium isolates were pinkish white, creamy white and cottony white. The colony shape of Fusarium species were regular and its compactness were fluffy, medium fluffy and compact. Length and breadth of macro-conidia of Fusarium species varied from 10.56 to 36.75 μm and from 3.76 to 6.17 μm at 7 DAI, respectively. In case of 15 days after inoculation, length and breadth of macro-conidia varied from 12.88 to 36.61 μm and from 3.62 to 6.69 μm, respectively. Total number of conidia of Fusarium isolates ranged from 60874.26 to 494480.55 and from 57532.47 to 439279.24 per cm² at 7 and 15 DAI, respectively. The radial mycelial growth of Sclerotium rolfsii ranged from 75.9 to 88.8 mm at 7 DAI and colony colour was off white to creamy white. The colony shape was regular and compactness was fluffy to medium fluffy. Colour of sclerotia was brownish and brown, and shape was round. The radial mycelial growth of Sclerotinia sclerotiorum isolates ranged from 37.3 to 50.7 mm and from 58.8 to 62.2 mm at 7 and 15 DAI, respectively. Colony colour of all isolates was whitish. The colony shape and compactness were regular and compact, respectively. Sclerotinia sclerotiorum initiated sclerotia at 6 DAI. Colour of sclerotia was whitish to dark brown and its shape was rough round. The radial mycelial growth of Rhizoctonia solani ranged from 75.0 to 85.0 mm at 7 DAI and colony colour was light creamy and creamy. The colony shape was regular and its compactness was fluffy to medium. Rhizoctonia solani initiated sclerotia after 6 days of inoculation. Colour of sclerotia was brown and deep brown, and shape of sclerotia was irregular.

View full abstract