Seasons’ influence on bulb, seed yield and quality of aggregatum onion, Allium cepa var aggregatum

A field experiment was conducted at the Department of Vegetable Crops, Horticultural College and Research Institute, Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, Coimbatore during September 2010 to April 2011. The study was conducted to evaluate the effect of planting season and genotypes performance on the bulb and seed production and quality of small onion. Four different planting seasons S₁ (September), S₂ (October), S₃ (November) and S₄ (December) and three genotypes G₁ (CO (On) 5), G₂ (Puttarasal type) and G₃ (Santhaipadugai Local) were used in the experiment. Data on different growth, yield and quality parameters were recorded and statistically analyzed. The results revealed that the highest seed and residual bulb yield (807 kg/ha and 8000 kg/ha respectively) was obtained from the September season planting (S₁) in Puttarasal genotype (G₂). Hence early planting season with local varieties is suggested for onion bulb and seed production in Coimbatore conditions.