Effect of Moisture Stress and Evapo-trasnpiration Suppressants on Growth and Yield of Summer Groundnut (Arachis hypogaea L.)

A field experiment was conducted to investigate the effect of moisture stress and evapo-transpiration suppressants on growth and yield performance of groundnut during summer season of 2012 at Regional Research Station, Anand Agriculture University, Anand (Gujarat) under sandy loam soil. Results indicated that without moisture stress produced 33.70% higher pod yield of groundnut over moisture stress imposed at flowering stage, but this no moisture stress was at par with moisture stress at preflowering for growth and yield attributes and pod yield. Maximum water use efficiency was observed under moisture stress at per-flowering. Moisture stress imposed at flowering stage was found to be detrimental for growth and yield. Among evapo-transpiration suppressant treatments, mulching with paddy straw @ 5 t/ha with kaolin 6% spray was found effective and brought remarkable improvement in plant height, number of branches and mature pods/plant and 100-kernel weight which resulted in higher pod yield (2756 kg/ha). The increase in pod yield was to the tune of 20.56% over control. The highest water use efficiency (6.72 kg/ha-mm) was observed with the use of paddy straw mulch along with kaolin 6% spray and the lowest with the control (5.57 kg/ha-mm). Maximum mature pods/plant and pod yield was registered under no moisture stress in conjunction with paddy straw mulch + kaolin 6% spray which was comparable with nomoisture stress with paddy straw mulch and moisture stress at pre-flowering with paddy straw mulch.