Assessing the Effect of Different Irrigation Regimes on the Crop Performance of Brinjal (Solanum melongena L.) in Gujarat, India

Abstract

This study investigated the effect of different irrigation on performance of brinjal to find the optimum IW: ETc ratio. This studywas laid out in research farm near Agrometeorological observatory, B. A. College of Agriculture, AAU, Anand (Gujarat), India during 2023-2024. The soil of the experiment field was loamy sand. The experiment utilized a Randomized Block Design to examine the influence of the IW: ETC ratio (I) on crop performance. The plot treatments consisted of five irrigation level IW: ETc ratios: I1 with a ratio of 1.00, I2 with a ratio of 0.80, I3 with a ratio of 0.60, I4 with a ratio of 0.40, and I5 following the recommended irrigation practices. Plant height, number of leaves, number of branches, leaf area index (LAI), dry weight of plant (g plant-1) were measured from three randomly selected plants from each plot at 30 days intervals after 30 DAT up to harvest. Number of fruit, fresh weight of fruit, yield were measured in each picking. The result showed that the significantly highest plant height was observed in the I1 treatment while the lowest was the I4 treatment. The highest number of leaves and branches were observed in I1 and significantly lowest was observed in I4. Fresh weight of fruit was highest in I1 and lowest in I4. Biomass was highest in I1 (184.49 gm) and lowest 140.41gm was recorded in I4.Significantly highest Leaf area index (LAI) was recorded in I1(3.98) and the lowest was recorded in I4(2.60). The number of fruit per plant and fruit diameter were highest and lowest were observed in I1 and I4. No significant difference was observed in the harvest index (HI) of the brinjal crop. Fruit yield was significantly highest in I1 (55.35 t ha-1) and lowest was recorded in I4(30.18 t ha-1).