Regional Agricultural Research Station, Kumarakom-686 566, (Kerala), India.
1Present Address: College of Agriculture, Vellayani, Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala-695 522, India.
A field experiment was conducted during the summer seasons (December–January to April–May) of 1998–99 and 1999–2000, to study the relative efficacy of four pre-emergence herbicides and soil solarization treatment in reducing weed infestation and in enhancing the yield of brinjal. Season-long crop-weed competition reduced the yield of brinjal by 51 and 49% during 1998–99 and 1999–2000, respectively. Soil solarization for one month registered the highest fruit yield during both the years (18.92 and 18.12 t/ha, respectively). The pre-emergence herbicides alachlor (2.0 and 2.5 kg a. i./ha), oxadiazon (0.5 and 0.75 kg a. i./ha) and pendimethalin (2.0 kg a. i./ha) and hand weeding twice treatments recorded fruit yields comparable to that of soil solarization. As far as weed dry weight is concerned, alachlor (2.0 and 2.5 kg a. i./ha) recorded excellent weed control comparable to weed free check at 30 and 60 DAT.
