Organic Nutrient Management in Colour Cotton in Vertisol Soil

Nutrient management is one of the greatest challenge in obtaining sustainable yield of crop over a
long period. The increasing food demands of a growing human population and the need for an
environmentally friendly strategy for  sustainable agricultural development  require significant attention for
enhancing crop productivity, hence the present experiment was conducted at Agriculture Research Station,
Achalpur (Dr. PDKV, Akola) Maharashtra state of India with an aim to achieved sustainable productivity.
Experiment was conducted in a Randomized Block Design with six treatments and four replications. The
average rainfall and its distribution were found normal in all five years of the experimentation. The PCA of
five year rainfall shows not much variation in the dimension. Seed treatment with beejamrut, azotobactor
and PSB along with biological pest control was followed in all treatments. Five rows of sunhemp, one row
of ambadi and two rows of Marigold were sown at the border of experimental plot. Five years of pooled
results revealed that colour cotton + black gram in 2:1 proportion at 60 cm spacing (mulching of black
gram after plucking of pods) + vermicompost @ 2.5 t ha-1 + jeevamrut 10% at 50 DAS recorded highest
seed equivalent yield (1318 kg ha-1) with highest B:C ratio (1.92).