During screening of twenty six essential oils against Botrytis cinerea, the essential oils of the ten plants viz. Chenopodium ambrosioides, Eucalyptus citriodora, Eupatorium cannabinum, Lawsonia inermis, Ocimum canum, O. gratissimum, O. sanctum, Prunus persica, Zingiber cassumunar and Z. officinale were found to exhibit absolute fungitoxic activity (100% growth inhibition). The essential oils of O. sanctum, P. persica and Z. officinale were selected for further investigation because these oils showed lower Minimum Inhibitory Concentration (MIC) as compared to the other fungitoxic oils. The selected oils were subsequently standardized through physico-chemical and fungitoxic properties. The MIC values of O. sanctum, P. persica and Z. officinale were found to be 200, 100 and 100 ppm (mg/l) respectively. The oils showed fungistatic nature at their respective MIC. The oils were thermostable, and exhibited a wide range of fungitoxicity against 15 other post-harvest fungal pathogens. The oils had the potency to withstand high inoculum density. The antifungal potency of oils was found to be greater in comparison to some prevalent synthetic fungicides. Practical applicability of the essential oils was observed in control of grey mould of grapes caused by B. cinerea during storage. The O. sanctum-and P. persica-oil-treated grapes showed enhancement of storage life up to 5 and 4 days respectively. The storage life of Z. officinale-oil-treated grapes was found to be enhanced up to 6 days. The oils did not exhibit any phytotoxic effect on the fruit peel. Therefore, the oils could be recommended as a potential source of ecofriendly botanical fungicide, after long term and wide ranging trials.

Land degradation is a global problem. Best management of degraded land can be done by evaluating the spatial variability of soil properties including chemical properties of degraded land and mapping such variations. Since, a significant portion of arable land in India is chemically degraded due to soil acidity; the present study was conducted to study the spatial variability of soil acidity (pH), electrical conductivity (EC), soil organic carbon (OC) content, exchangeable potassium (K+), calcium (Ca2+) and magnesium (Mg2+) contents in some cropped acid soils of India. A total of four hundred (one hundred from each series) representative surface (0–0.15 m depth) soil samples were collected from arable soils representing four soil series namely Hariharapur, Debatoli, Rajpora and Neeleswaram situated in Orissa, Jharkhand, Himachal Pradesh and Kerala states of India, respectively, and were analyzed. Soil acidity (pH between 3.90 and 6.45) showed a low variability, in contrast to other soil properties, which showed moderate variability. The coefficients of variation varied from 32.4 to 74.3, 31.2 to 50.9, 45.6 to 100, 71.9 to 93.0 and 59.0 to 79.8% for EC (mean between 0.05 and 0.09 dS m−1), OC (mean between 0.29 to 1.86%), exchangeable K+ (mean between 39.1 and 77.7 mg kg−1), Ca2+ (mean between 148 and 293 mg kg−1) and Mg2+ (mean between 111 and 191 mg kg−1), respectively. Soil pH and OC content were positively and significantly correlated with exchangeable K+, Ca2+ and Mg2+ content. Geostatistical analysis revealed that the best fit models were gaussian, exponential and spherical for different soil properties with moderate to strong spatial dependency. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

No abstract

No abstract

tions at specified growth stages is the most common practice followed by the farmers (PhilRice, 1991;Pillai Low N use efficiency (NUE) continues to be a problem in the rice and Kundu, 1993).This does not consider the dynamic (Oryza sativa L.)-wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) cropping system. The leaf color chart (LCC)-based real-time N management can be crop N requirement and soil N supply because N recomused to optimize/synchronize N application with crop demand or to mendations were mainly derived from empirical testing improve existing fixed split N recommendations. We conducted a field of N response to few fixed doses. In fixed-time recomexperiment during 2001-2003 at Modipuram, India, to determine the mended N split schedule, the N splitting is skewed, the threshold LCC values for N application in rice and wheat, assess the first two splittings [one as basal at the time of planting/ need for basal N application, calibrate the LCC with a chlorophyll sowing and another at 25 to 30 d after transplanting meter (SPAD), and work out the economics of rice-wheat systems. (DAT) in rice and 21 to 25 d after sowing (DAS) in Treatments consisted of LCC scores of 2 to 5 for different cultivars wheat] occur at 21 to 30 DAS/DAT, and third dose is of rice and wheat and were compared with the zero-N control and a split at panicle initiation (PI) stage. In some rice-growrecommended fixed-time N splitting. In rice, LCC Յ 3 for 'Basmatiing countries, present recommendations call for 50 to 370', 4 for 'Saket-4', and 5 for 'Hybrid 6111/PHB-71' produced higher yield and NUE than recommended N splits. In wheat, maintenance and A.