YIELD AND QUALITY OF CHICKPEA AS AFFECTED BY SOWING DATES

Abstract

A field experiment was conducted at the Agronomy research field of Sher-e-Bangla Agricultural University, Dhaka, during the period from November 2014 to June 2015 to observe the effect of sowing dates and variety on growth, yield and quality of chickpea. The experiment comprised of main plot: two chickpea varieties: BARI Chola-5 and BARI Chola-9 and sub-plots to be five different sowing dates: November 05, November 20, December 05, December 20 and January 04. The experiment was laid out in split- plot design with three replications. The results revealed significant variations in date to emergence, plant height, number of branches plant maturity, number of pods plant -1 , pod length, seeds pod -1 , days to first flowering, days to -1 , weight of 1000 seeds, seed yield, stover yield, biological yield, shelling percentage and harvest index due variety and sowing dates. Seed quality attributes viz germination percentage, vigor index, number of leaves per seedling, shoot length, root length and total dry matter content of seedling also varied due to variety and sowing time. Delayed sowing affected the chickpea plant growth, its yield and the quality of seed. In the case of varieties, more or less significant variation was observed in all parameters, here, BARI Chola-9 showed better performance over BARI Chola-5. Interaction of variety and sowing date significantly affected the seed yield. BARI Chola-9 sown on November 20 produced maximum seed yield and that the lowest seed yield January 04. The maximum weight of 1000 seeds, highest stover yield, harvest index, maximum germination percentage and vigor index were found when chickpea was sown on 20 November and ensure the best performance. Irrespective of variety, delayed sowings showed lower performance on all parameters especially yield contributing parameters and yield of chickpea