Performance of newly introduced fodder crops in ricewheat cropping system in adopted villages of Bareilly district in North Western U.P.

Abstract

Two demonstrations were conducted in the adopted villages of IVRI for transfer of technology from lab to land programme.Trials were conducted in the project villages viz., Mohanpur, Kalapur in 2003-4 and khata, Bhansar during 2013-14 after ten years. Napier Hybrid NB 21, multi cut Bajra (Ganga kaveri,Pearl millet) as new crops were introduced in the study area .Forage maize (Sweta) was grown for comparative study as a control forage crop. The growth of napier Hybrid NB 21 was found to be fast growing crop over the other forage crop during summer and rainy seasons.Napier Hybrid raised wih scientific package of practices on farmers field.This crop gave 825.1 q/ha green fodder.the crop was harvested 4-5 times by the farmers.Maize cultivar Sweta was harvested at 45-75 days after sowing.This maize provided for one month fodder while, NB hybrid gave green fodder round the year. Maize gave 525.4 q/ha green fodder. Forage liking of animal feeding or palatability was maximum for forage maize. Pealmillet multi cut cultivar Ganga Kaveri harvested 3-4 times by September and produced 445.7 q/ha leafy, succulent fodder to milch animals during summer and rainy seasons. This was the second choice of animals. This was found to be good for feeding dairy animals long with wheat straw in 50:50 ratio of green and dry feeding balanced diet. However, palatability of NBH was after Multi Cut Bajra. After ten years area under forage crops was inceased 2-3 times. NBH from zero to 20 ha and MCB 3 ha and maize from 2 ha to 7 ha in the adopted villages. Some farmers started green fodder for sale in Rithoura to get more profits per acer of land. Technology adoption rate was higher in adopted villages than the near bynon adopted villages.