GROWTH AND YIELD OF CUCUMBER VARIETIES AS INFLUENCED BY VARIED MOISTURE LEVELS WITH ORGANIC GROWING MEDIA

Abstract

A field study was carried out in January-October 2021 to evaluate the effect of deficit irrigation on physiology, plant growth, and yield of cucumber cultivars. The experiment was conducted in a completely randomized design with three irrigation levels (I 0

=100% field capacity, I 1 = 80% field capacity and I 2 = 60% field capacity) as main plot factor and three cultivars (V 1 = Mamra, V 2 = Baromashi and V 3 = Maroon) as subplot factor with three replications. Regarding irrigation levels, I 0 (100%) showed the highest plant height and highest number of leaves of 260.12 cm and 165.44 respectively, I 1 (80 %) produced the highest cucumber fruit yield of 2001.98 gm/plant while I 2 (60 %) produced the lowest yield of 951.37 gm/plant. In the matter of combined effect, V 1

resulted in maximum vine length (248.20 cm), number of leaves (124.67), female flower (16), fruit per plant (9), fruit weight (392.17 gm) and yield (3588.03 gm) were recorded from the combination of I 0 and I 1 treatment. V 2 expressed maximum vine length (310.70cm), number of leaves (191.67), fruit per plant (14), fruit weight (178 gm), yield (2483.83 gm) and female flower (18.67) were recorded from the combination of I 0 and I 1 treatment. V 3 expressed maximum vine length (221.47 cm), number of leaves (71.36), female flower (25.67), fruit per plant (20), fruit weight (24.78 gm) and yield (478.80 gm) were recorded from the combination of I 0 and I 1 treatment. These results suggest that 80% irrigation level can be recommended for successful cucumber production without causing a significant decline in fruit yield.