Journal of Environmental and Agricultural Sciences (JEAS). Haider et al., 2022. Volume 24(1&2): 1-9
Open Access – Research Article
Impact of Seed Sources, Genotypes and Fertilizer Sources on Onion Set Production Potential
Muhammad Wasim Haider 1,2, Khurram Ziaf *1, Raheel Anwar 1, Aman Ullah Malik 1,
Muhammad Muzammil Jahangir 1, Rehan Riaz 3, Muhammad Asif 3, Babar Ehsan Bajwa 3,
Muhammad Awais Ghani 1, Yasir Majeed 1, Chaudhary Muhammad Ayyub 1
1Institute of Horticultural Sciences, University of Agriculture Faisalabad-38040, Pakistan
2Department of Horticultural Sciences, The Islamia University of Bahawalpur, Pakistan
3Centre for Agriculture and Bioscience International, Rawalpindi, Pakistan
Abstract: Onion is an important commercial vegetable of Pakistan, used daily as culinary item. Its prices are usually low during April-June, the time when Sindh and Punjab crops are available in the market, due to which the growers cannot get a good return from their seasonal crop (May). However, market demand and therefore price is high during the months of November and December. Production and availability of kharif onion crop through sets during this period can pay a good profit. Therefore, this study was carried out at Vegetable Research Area, University of Agriculture Faisalabad; with the aim to determine the set production potential of three onion cultivars viz. Red Bone, TI-172 and in comparison with Phulkara; ii) influence of seed source (Magnus Kahl Seeds [MKS] and Government source [Govt.]) on set production of cv. Phulkara; and ii) the effect of two phosphatic fertilizers, diammonium phosphate (DAP) and nitrophos (NP), applied @ 100 g 272.25 ft-2five times at two-week interval on set production of onion cv. Phulkara. Two experiments were conducted for this purpose, which were replicated three times. Results showed that Phulkara (MKS) produced the highest number of sets (1807/45.5 ft2) while Red Bone produced the lowest number (119). Also, the Phulkara (MKS) had the largest individual (1.9 g) and total (2761.5 g/45.5 ft2) set weights than that of any experimental cultivars. The application of DAP produced highest number of sets (1187.3/45.5 ft2) and individual set weight (1.46 g), followed by NP and then control. Our results indicate that the Phulkara (MKS) showed a strong potential in terms of producing a good number and healthier sets. While DAP application to Phulkara (Govt.) produced the highest number of sets having the greatest mean set weight. It was concluded that newly available onion hybrids in the market don’t have set production potential. Moreover, seed source has great impact on good quality set production of those cultivars which had been reported to have sets production potential.
Keywords: Allium cepa L.; Kharif crop; Phulkara; TI-172; Red Bone; Set formation index
*Corresponding author: Khurram Ziaf, email: khurramziaf@uaf.edu.pk
Cite this article as Haider, M.W., K. Ziaf, R. Anwar, A.U. Malik, M.M. Jahangir, R. Riaz, M. Asif, B.E. Bajwa, M.A. Ghani, Y. Majeed and C.M. Ayyub. 2022. Impact of Seed Sources, Genotypes and Fertilizer Sources on Onion Set Production Potential. Journal of Environmental & Agricultural Sciences. 24(1&2): 1-9.
Copyright © Haider et al., 2022. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium provided the original author and source are appropriately cited and credited.