Influence of Drip Irrigation Regimes and Lateral Spacing on Cumin Productivity

Abstract

Cumin is one of the important spice crops grown in arid and semi arid regions of India and is being adopted to cure some of the dreaded diseases. Determination of optimum water requirement which is function of soil crop and atmosphere is needed for achieving more profit and higher productivity per unit of water. Keeping in view, a field experiment was undertaken to access the conjugate impact of three irrigation regimes (0.6IW/ETc, 0.8IW/ETc and1.0IW/ETc) and three lateral spacing (0.60m, 0.70m and 0.80m) on productivity of cumin. Split plot design with three treatment replications was adopted. Drip irrigation with 0.8 IW/ETc resulted higher seed yield, plant height and dry matter of 1344.17 kg/ha, 36.42 cm and 2365 kg/ha respectively at 0.8 IW/ETc with lateral spacing 0.6 m as compared to other treatments. Highest water use efficiency (5.58 kg/ha.mm) was observed at 0.6 IW/ETc with 0.60 m lateral spacing. Highest B:C ratio (2.27) observed at 0.8 IW/ETcwith lateral spacing 0.6m as compared to other treatments.

Response of Drip Irrigation and Fertigation on Cumin Yield, Quality, and Water-Use Efficiency Grown under Arid Climatic Conditions

“…Our results revealed that drip irrigation at 0.6 CPE (I 0.6 ) enhanced the plant height by 15% and 5.36% over surface irrigation at CPE of 0.8 and drip irrigation at 0.4 CPE, respectively. These results are in close agreement with the results of Kunapara et al [27], who reported that the highest plant height was observed at 0.8 Irrigation water/Crop evapotranspiration (IW/ETc) ratio. Drip irrigation significantly enhanced the number of branches per plant.…”

“…In our present study, the highest pooled B:C ratio was 2.9, which was equal at both 0.6 IW/ETc and 0.8 IW/ETc. Our economic results are in close agreement with the study of Kunapara et al [27], who reported the highest B:C ratio (2.39) at 0.8 IW/ETc with a lateral spacing of 0.6 m in cumin. Jat et al [40] also found that drip irrigation at an IW/CPE ratio 0.8 with paired row planting, being at par with 0.8 IW/CPE ratio in normal row planting and 1.0 IW/CPE ratio in normal and paired row planting, recorded significantly higher net returns and a B:C ratio over 0.4 and 0.6 IW/CPE ratios with normal and paired row planting.…”

“…Similar findings have been reported by Lal et al [32], who revealed that irrigation regimes 0.6 IW/CPE ratio with drip irrigation had superior seed yields of fenugreek. Kunapara et al [33] reported that an application of drip irrigation with 0.8 IW/ETc yielded higher seed yield, plant height, and dry matter in cumin. Kanwar et al [34] reported that drip irrigation at 75% CPE recorded the highest growth and yield, but it was on par with drip irrigation at 50% CPE.…”

“…Overall, the drip irrigation has a regulating effect on reducing energy use and soluble nutrient losses, creating well-aerated conditions, minimizing over irrigation, and increasing water-use efficiency by maintaining high soil matric potential in the root zone of the plant [46,47]. Drip irrigation enhances yield with low water availability because the congenial conditions for better growth are maintained in the root zone throughout the crop growth period [27].…”

Tackling the Constraints of Cumin Cultivation and Management Practices

“…There was 46% saving in water and 10-12% increase in seed yield with drip irrigation method as compared to surface irrigation [11]. The use of micro sprinkler in irrigating cumin crop is discouraged because it requires more energy than a drip system [54]. In order to provide irrigation by micro-sprinkler system the optimum IW/CPE ratio should be 0.8 [35,97].…”