Asian Journal of Agricultural Extension, Economics & Sociology

Abstract

Field experiments were conducted for four consecutive Kharif season of 2017-2020 at Organic Farming Research Centre, Sher-e- Kashmir University of Agricultural Sciences and Technology of Jammu, Chatha, located at 32⁰ 66' North latitude and 74⁰ 79' East longitude with an altitude of 356 meters above mean sea level in the Shiwalik foothills of North-Western Himalayas. The mean annual rainfall of the experimental site is 1198.2mm of which 70-75% rainfall is received from June to September. The soil of the experimental site was sandy clay loam in texture, slightly alkaline in reaction, medium in organic carbon, available phosphorus and potassium but low in available nitrogen. The experiment was laid out in split plot design with three replications. The experiment consisted of 05 (five) organic nutrients sources treatments with two crop establishment methods. The results showed that there were maximum plant growth characters of organic Basmati 370 like plant height, number of tillers, number of productive tillers, root length, number of roots, root volume, biological yield etc after using vermicompost @ 3.0 t ha-1 followed by FYM @ 8 t ha-1 under SRI method. In addition, SRI method was found to be effective in reducing pest and disease incidence, shortening crop rotations and improving plant conditions. It was found from the study that among the various treatments of organic nutrient sources, the highest (132.13 q/ha) biological yield of basmati 370 was recorded with the application of vermicompost @ 3t/ha which was statistically at par the application of FYM @ 8t/ha (130.20q/ha) respectively under SRI method.