Assessment of quality biomass production potential of forage sorghum hybrids in semi-arid conditions of Haryana

Abstract

Sorghum being a C4 crop has diverse uses as food, feed, fodder and fuel. But among kharif forages sorghum has great potential to provide quality forage and fodder for animal use. It is best suited in semi-arid regions due to its drought tolerance nature as compared to fodder maize. By keeping these points in consideration, we have planned an experiment to evaluate eleven CMS based forage sorghum hybrids for green and dry biomass potential along with their fodder quality along with two checks. The most productive hybrids among them were SHH 1836 (GFY: 673.5 and DFY: 161.2 q/ha); SHH 1911 (GFY: 645.0 and DFY: 159.0 q/ha); SHH 1903 (GFY: 642.0 and DFY: 159.3 q/ha); SHH 1812 (GFY: 631.5 and DFY: 154.6 q/ha); SHH 1513 (GFY: 627.3 and DFY: 153.3 q/ha) and SHH 1916 (GFY: 624.3 and DFY: 148.3 q/ha) having 18.2, 13.0, 12.7, 10.8, 10.1 and 9.6 % increase for green biomass yield and 15.1, 14.0, 14.1, 10.7, 9.8 and 6.2 % increase for dry matter yield, respectively. As far as quality of these hybrids are concerned SHH 1836 was best among all hybrids having crude protein content 11.37% and 61.2% IVDMD clubbed with highest green biomass yield and tolerance to foliar disease and insect pest attack.