Performance of groundnut (Arachis hypogaea L.) cultivars under differentplant populations during early kharif

Abstract

A field experiment was conducted in sandy loam soils to study the performance of groundnut cultivars (Abhaya, TAG-24, Dharani and Kadiri-6) under different plant populations (3.33, 4.44, 5.00 and 6.66 lakh ha<sup>-1</sup>) during early kharif, 2013, at Sri Venkateswara Agricultural College Farm, Tirupati campus of Acharya N.G. Ranga Agricultural University, Andhra Pradesh. The results revealed that the highest stature of yield attributes viz., number of filled pods plant<sup>-1</sup>, pod to peg percentage, hundred pod and kernel weight were significantly higher with groundnut variety Dharani compared to rest of the varieties due to better partitioning of photosynthates to sink. The groundnut cultivar Dharani recorded 42.0, 32.2 and 17.0 per cent higher pod yield compared to Abhaya, Kadiri-6 and TAG-24, respectively. All the yield components were significantly higher with plant population of 3.33 lakh ha<sup>-1</sup>. The pod yield of groundnut with plant population of 5.00 lakh ha<sup>-1</sup> was increased by 2.8, 7.2 and 14.0 per cent compared to 3.33, 4.44 and 6.66 lakh ha<sup>-1</sup>, respectively. The higher pod yield of groundnut during early kharif in sandy loam soil was obtained with groundnut cultivar Dharani at plant population of 5.00 lakh ha<sup>-1</sup>.