Interest in conservation measures, including reduced tillage, zero tillage, and crop residue retention, is growing in major rice growing areas of the world; particularly in the Indo-Gangetic plains. Of late, research interest is increasing in India for a specialised method of cultivation known as natural farming, which aims at maintain the functional biodiversity of the farm with little or no use of external inputs. With the increasing water crisis at a global level, it became imperative to develop technologies that can reduce the water use, particularly in water-guzzling low land paddy, by developing alternate cultivation methods; direct seeded rice is one such technology. A two-year field experiment was carried out at two locations during 2019–2020 and 2020–2021 to find out the impact of different cultivation and varieties on the productivity and profitability of the rice–wheat cropping system. The experiments were conducted in split plot design, replicated thrice, with cultivation practices in the main plot and varieties of both wheat and rice in the sub plot. The results so obtained reveal that conventional tillage significantly out yielded other methods of cultivation in both the crops at both the locations, while significantly lower grain yield in both crops was observed from natural farming. Adoption of reduced tillage, zero tillage and natural farming reduced the grain yield of wheat by 4.6%, 10.9%, and 59.4% over conventional tillage, while the corresponding decline in grain yield of rice was 10.8%, 16.1%, and 34.0% with reduced tillage, zero tillage, and natural farming, respectively. Among the varieties tested, HPW 368 and Him Palam Lal Dhan 1 (HPR 2795) produced significantly higher grain yield of wheat and rice, respectively, at both the locations during both years. Conventional tillage among cultivation practices and HPW 368 and Him Palam Lal Dhan 1 (HPR 2795) among wheat and rice varieties also proved to be better in terms of various economic indicators, including gross return, net return, and ratio benefit cost ratio (B:C ratio).

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The effects of BA, ethephon, and GA3 on freshly harvested cormels of three cultivars of Gladiolus sp. were studied for 3 years. The treatment with 400 mg·L-1 ethephon significantly reduced the dormancy period by 17.5 days as compared to control, while BA and GA3 were found to be less effective. Among all treatments, ethepon at 400 mg·L-1 was found to be the most effective in altering the days to sprout, sprouting percentage, corm size and production and development of cormels. While GA3 at 100 mg·L-1 increased growth of corms and cormels, BA at 25 mg·L-1 increased growth of corms and cormels. BA at 25 mg·L-1 only influenced the sprouting percentage of cormels. Along with reducing the dormancy period, the plant growth regulators stimulated growth and development of corms and cormels. Chemical names used: benzyladenine (BA); 2-chloroethylphosphonic acid (ethephon); gibberellic acid (GA3).

A field experiment was undertaken at the Experimental Farm of Department of Agronomy of CSK Himachal Pradesh Krishi Vishvavidyalaya, Palampur (H.P.) during kharif 2019 to study the effect of different tillage system and varieties on yield of rice. The treatments consisted of three rice varieties (viz., HPR 1156, HPR 2656 and HPR 2795) which were tested under three tillage systems viz., conventional tillage, and minimum tillage without residue and minimum tillage with residue treatment. The trial was laid out in split plot design with tillage system in main plot and rice varieties in sub plot and was replicated thrice. Conventional tillage recorded taller plants (124.50 cm) and higher dry matter accumulation (858.49 g/m-2) which was followed by minimum tillage without residue. Among the varieties tested HPR 2795 recorded taller plants (128.31 cm) and higher dry matter accumulation (891.33 g/m-2) which was followed by HPR 2656. Higher value of AGR, CGR and RGR was recorded in conventional tillage and among the varieties; HPR 2795 resulted in higher growth indices.

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