Productivity and Quality of Horticultural Crop Capsicum (Capsicum Annum L) Through Co-Inoculation of Novel Microbial Consortium Plant Growth Promoting Rhizobacteria, Glycoprotein Producing AM Fungi and Chemical Fertilizer under Low-Cost Protected Cultivation

Abstract

Capsicum (Capsicum annum L.) is a common vegetable crop with a wide range of culinary utilization worldwide. In horticultural practices, inoculating the planting medium with a beneficial microbial consortium is a novel approach to cultivating highquality, healthy plants with abundant nutrition. In the following study, inoculation of a selected microbial consortium consisting of PGPR (Azotobacter, Pseudomonas, Fraturia, Azospirillum, and Bacillus spp.) and glycoprotein producing AM fungi (Aculospora logula-15%, Glomus fasciculatum-20%, Glomus intraradices-40%, Gigaspora margarita-15%, and Scutellospora heterogama-10%) was inoculated to the planting medium in beds to raise capsicum plants in a low cost protected cultivation. Plant height, stem girth, fruit weight, fruit diameter, number of fruits per plant, and weight of fruit per plant parameters to be considered in the study. Mycorrhizal root colonization, macro, and micronutrient uptake, and quality yield, were increased the most with multiple microbial inoculations. Treatments revealed that plants inoculated with the multiple microbial consortia increased substantially faster than plants treated with chemical fertilizer (100 % RDF) and control. Maximum yield (742.5 q ha-1) was recorded in treatment Absolute’s consortium PGPR+ AM Fungi along with maximum values of shelf life (7.10 DAS), TSS (Brix0 5.63), the number of fruit/plant (8.20), fruit length (8.5cm), fruit diameter (7. 81cm) and fruit weight (224g) as compared with control and other biological treatments. The best treatment with respect to projected yield was Absolute consortium PGPR + AM fungi followed by control. Based on the various growth and microbiological parameters studied, it was concluded that inoculation with the multiple microbial consortia (Absolute consortium PGPR+AM fungi) was beneficial for raising healthy, vigorously growing capsicum plants under low-cost protected conditions.