Influence of Plant Density and Application of Different NPK Doses on Growth and Yield Performances of Cucumber (Cucumis Sativus L.) under the Open Field Conditions in Kabul, Afghanistan

Abstract

The present study was conducted for one growing season from 12th March 2022 to 15th July 2022 in Horticulture Research Farm at Agriculture Faculty of Kabul University in open field, with the specific objective of finding out the interaction influence of three plant density and four NPK doses as a treatment on the growth and yield parameters of Nahid-F1 variety of cucumber. The experiment was laid out following the Factorial Randomized Block Design (FRBD), with three replications consisting of combined three level of plant geometry viz. 75×35 cm (S1), 75×45 cm (S2) and 75×55 cm and four doses of NPK viz., control (F0), 60:30:30 (F1), 80:40:40 (F2) and 120:60:60 (F3) as a treatment. The data on growth attributes and yield contributing characteristics of cucumber crop were recorded and analyzed trough SPSS (22) software (2011) using Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) for Factorial Randomized Black Design (FRBD). The results obtained from the current study reveal that all growth and yield characteristics under the study were remarkably influenced by plant density and dose of NPK and cucumber variety of Nahid-F1 performed better with T12 (75×55 cm + NPK 120:60:60), T8 (75×35 cm + NPK 120:60:60) and T3 (75×35 cm + NPK 80:40:40) in respect to the various growth and yield characteristics, such as number of branches, number of leaves per plant, plant height, stem girth, days to first flower bud initiation, days of first fruits picking, fruit length, fruit girth, average fresh fruit weight, number of fruits per plant, number of fruit per vine, yield per square meter and yield per hectare. While T1 (75×35 cm + control), T5 (75×45 cm + control) and T9 (75×55 cm + control) did not show any superiority in any growth and yield attributes as evaluated in Kabul agro-climatic region. Thus, T8 and T12 could be recommended to the farmers of Kabul province for better cucumber production in Kabul agro-climatic condition in Central Afghanistan.