EFFECT OF INTEGRATED NUTRIENT MANAGEMENT ON GROWTH AND YIELD ATTRIBUTES OF CUCUMBER ( CUCUMIS SATIVUS L . ) CV . SWARNA AGETI UNDER POLYHOUSE CONDITIONS

Cucumber (Cucumis sativus L.) is a warm season vegetable, grown throughout the world under tropical and subtropical conditions. It is said to be the native of northern India.Cucumber is a highly cross pollinated crop and usually monoecious in nature preferring warm weather and bright light for its better growth and development. However, it can be grown in both summer and rainy seasons, but it can’t tolerate cold injury (Rastogi, 1998). It is one of the most important salad crops grown extensively throughout India as well as the world. In India the total cucumber production in 2014-15 was 0.685 million tons from 0.044 million hectare area (NHB database, 2015). The immature fruits of cucumber are used both for salad as well as for pickling purpose. The cucumber pickle ranks first in the world. The fruits of cucumber possess various medicinal properties e.g. cooling effect, prevents constipation, checks jaundice and indigestion. There is well response from cucumber towards manuring and fertilization. Average farmers cannot afford the extensive use of expensive commercial fertilizers as per the recommendations. In order to achieve an improved production, application of high cost inputs like inorganic fertilizers, herbicides, pesticides, etc. can be advocated but on the other hand we also have to look at the soil health and environment sustainability.Integrated Nutrient Management (INM) system refers to the balanced use of chemical fertilizers in combination with organic manures, crop residues, biofertilizers and other biological sources (Thriveni et al., 2015). INM maintains soil as storehouses of plant nutrients that are essential for vegetative growth. The goal of INM is to integrate the use of all natural and man-made sources of plant nutrients, so that crop productivity increases in an efficient and environmentally benign manner, without sacrificing soil productivity of future generations (Maruthi et al., 2014). Higher dose of fertilizers, although inexpensive for some farmers in developed countries, induces neither substantially greater crop nutrient uptake nor significantly higher yields (Smaling and Braun, 1996). The protected vegetable cultivation technology can be utilized for the year round production of high value quality vegetable crops. Increasing photosynthetic efficiency and reduction in transpiratory loss are major advantages of protected cultivation. Both of these are of vital importance for healthy and luxuriant growth of crop plants. This technology is highly suitable for farmers in peri-urban areas of the country, especially in northern plains of India. But, protected cultivation requires careful planning and attention including selection of varieties, suitable production technology like spacing, time of planting, water and nutrient management and plant protection to produce economic yield of good quality. However, no precise information is available on the influence of integrated nutrient management on growth and yield attributes of cucumber under protected condition. Therefore, the objective of the research was to find out the ABSTRACT The present investigation was carried out in order to study the effects of integrated nutrient management on cucumber cv. Swarna Ageti under polyhouse conditions conducted during the Kharif season of 2015 at Vegetable Research Farm, Institute of Agricultural Sciences, Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi (U.P.). From the results it is concluded that the application of various combinations of organic, inorganic and bio-fertilizer sources of nutrients at optimum level evidenced to be effective in promoting germination per cent, growth, flowering and yield of the cucumber. The most effective among all the combinations of organic, inorganic and bio-fertilizer sources of nutrients for minimum number of days to 50 per cent flowering (44.33), fruit length (15.11 cm), fruit weight (176.22 g), number of edible fruits per vine (9) and maximum edible fruit yield per hectare (58.73 t/ha) is found to be 60 per cent each of RDF and vermicompost along with Azotobacter, Trichoderma and PSB. From the results it can be concluded that the application of different combinations of organic, inorganic and bio-fertilizer source of nutrients at optimum level proved to be effective in promoting germination per cent, growth, flowering and yield of cucumber.