Growth, Yield and Water Use Efficiency Response of Greenhouse Grown Capsicum under Deficit and PRD Method of Irrigation

Abstract

A study was conducted to compare two water-saving practices, deficit irrigation (DI) and partial root zone drying (PRD), and to examine how they affect water use, growth and yield of greenhouse grown capsicum compared to control irrigation (CI). The effect of PRD on the growth of capsicum plant was significant. The results showed that capsicum fruit yield was highest for control (full irrigation), followed by the deficit irrigation treatment (DI-75 %) and then 1 PRD treatment. The analysis suggested that the treatment 1 PRD outperformed 2 PRD and DI-50 in terms of fruit yield. The yield loss in PRD treatment was only 11.1 % compared to control, whereas amount of water applied was 50 % less than through control irrigation. The highest water use efficiency was achieved for treatment of 1 PRD with 63 % improvement in irrigation efficiency over control. The treatment 1 PRD used 20.60 litres of water to produce 1 kg capsicum as against 33.61 litres under control treatment.