Vol. 11, Issue 9 (2022)

Author(s):
Jadhav KP, Panchbhai DM, Bahadure Asha, Patil SR and Ramteke NH

Abstract:
The present investigation entitled “Effect of severity of pruning and fruit retention on vegetative parameters of custard apple” was carried out during 2019-20 and 2020-21 Farmers field at Dhanaj (Bu), Tq-Karanja, Dist-Washim (MS) to study the effect of severity of pruning on flowering, fruit setting and fruit development of custard apple. The experiment was laid out in Split Plot Design designed with four severity of pruning viz., P_1- No pruning (control), P_2- Light pruning: thickness of branch 3-5 mm (Refill thickness), P_3- Medium pruning: thickness of branch 6-10 mm (Pencil thickness) and P_4-Hard pruning: thickness of branch 11-15 mm (Thumb thickness) and fruit thinning are T_1- no thinning (control), T_2- Fruit retention up to 100 fruits per plant, T_3-Ffruit retention up to 80 fruits per plant, T_4- Fruit retention up to 60 fruits per plant and T_5-fruit retention up to 40 fruits per plant.Light pruning shows the highest number of flowers per branch. However, maximum fruit set percentage and less stony fruit percentage was obtained in medium pruning. Early sprouting, maximum number of shoots emerged per branch, minimum days to flowering and minimum days to harvesting was found in unpruned plant. The early harvesting and less stone fruit were noticed in fruit retention up to 40 fruit per plant followed by fruit retention up to 60 fruit per plant. The fruit retention does not show any significant effect on growth parameters except days to harvesting and stony fruit percentage.