DEVELOPMENT OF AN AGRO TECHNIQUE FOR LARGE-SCALE PRODUCTION OF GERANIUM’S PLANTLETS FOR CULTIVATION AND BRINJAL INTERCROPPING

Abstract

Essential oil-bearing medicinal and aromatic plant Pelargonium graveolense is commonly known as rose-scented geranium because of its characteristic rose like smell. Its essential oil possesses medicinal properties such as insect repellent properties and also used in fragrance and food industry. Its demand is very high because of the above use in India and the worldwide market. This experiment is designed to develop an agro technique method for large scale production of geranium plantlets (cultivar CIM-Pawan) at field conditions using simple stem cutting method at North Indian field conditions in Uttar Pradesh, India. And also introduce a new method of intercropping cultivation of geranium in Brinjal (Solanum melongena) that is developed. This experiment was designed in such a manner to developed thousand plantlets from one year old a single mother plants. As we know near about 30,000 stem cuttings are required for planting an area of one hectare land. So focusing on large demands of plantlets developed an agro technique that is able to fulfil the requirements. The crops were raised using one month olds plantlets transplanting, viz. with intercropping in Brinjal. After harvesting oil was extracted by hydro-distillation using Clevenger apparatus and analyzed by gas chromatography (GC). The Citronellol/Geraniol ratio (C: G), quality determining factor was found to 1.23. The GC and GC-MS analysis results indicated that the essential oil components, quality and quantity were significant. The major constituents of the essential oil were Citronellol (29.81%), Geraniol (24.23%), Linalool (3.12%), Iso-menthone (4.09%), Citronellyl formate (7.51%), Geranyl formate (6.07%), and 10-epi-γ-eudesmol (2.70%).