Abstract:
A field study was conducted at National Agricultural Research Centre (NARC), Islamabad, during two crop years (2003 - 04) to determine the effect of different weed control methods on the yield and yield components of cowpeas. In this study different weed control methods (chemical, mechanical, hand-weeding & their integration) were compared for their efficiency to control various weed species under rain-fed conditions of Pakistan. Among different weed control methods, chemical-weeding (Stomp @ 3.75 L ha-1) at 2 - 3 leaf stage of weeds + hand-weeding at 50 DAS gave promising results. This was closely followed by mechanical weeding after 20 days of crop sowing. Maximum reduction in density and biomass of the weeds was observed by chemical-weeding at 2 - 3 leaf stage of weeds + hand-weeding at 50 DAS. There was a significant increase (68%) in grain yield of cowpea due to chemical-weeding at 2 - 3 leaf stage of weeds + hand-weeding at 50 DAS. Similarly, this treatment out yielded other treatments in terms of number of pods per plant, number of seeds per pod, 1000 grain weight, plant biomass and grain yield. The economic analysis of these weed control methods also showed better performance of chemicalweeding at 2 - 3 leaf stage of weeds + hand-weeding at 50 DAS as compared to rest of the treatments.
Page(s):
120-124
DOI:
DOI not available
Published:
Journal: International Journal of Agriculture and Biology, Volume: 9, Issue: 1, Year: 2007