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Thursday, February 9, 2012

Update on Watermelon..

Our second short term crop was sowed in 3rd week of December. In case you missed it, you can look up http://techie2aggie.blogspot.in/2011/12/watermelon-short-term-crop-2.html

Today is the 50th day and the growth has been good so far. This year the crop in TN has been affected due to excessive morning dew and Cyclone Thane (which occured last week of December). One would think that due to lesser supply, the market rate would be higher; however, influx of watermelons from Karanataka and AP has kept the rate fairly constant.


At 26 days..















Flowering was first seen at 28 days. Flower on the left is female while the other one is male flower. Unlike Brinjal, watermelon is a cross pollinated crop.











At 40 days.















Healthy green foliage at 43 days.

















So far we have not had any serious pest issues. Red spider mites were seen occasionally on the back side of the leaves. Detecting these can be challenging especially in red soil. Simba 2ml/L was used for this. In the first 20 days, green caterpillars were noticed, Larvin 2g/L was used to control them. A few leaf miners were seen as well for which any systemic insecticide can be used.

Deficiency of Boron leads to splitting of fruits. A couple of fruits were found to be cracked a few days back. Solubor, which is water soluble will be applied along with the fertigation that we give every 3 days.

In another 20-30 days, we hope to harvest the crop. More updates then!

4 comments:

  1. We have cultivating watermelon - 26 days old....

    What are the fertlizers you applied after base dose. Can u please tell me what fertigation u give every 3 days.

    We applied DAP + potash - seeding
    Second dose DAP + potash + Abda after 20 days.
    Now thinking of all 19 every 5 days.

    Thanks
    Ramesh
    9940362755

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  2. Day 3 - Day 9 (3 day interval) : Urea - 10 Kg, All 19 - 9 Kg, Poassium NITRATE - 4 kg

    Day 12- Day 30 : Urea - 16 Kg, Poassium NITRATE - 10 kg, Mono Ammonium Phosphate - 2 kg

    Day 33- Day 51: Urea - 14 Kg, Poassium NITRATE - 7kg, All 19 - 6 kg

    Day 54 - Day 66 - Urea 22 kG, Potassium nitrate - 13 kg, Mono Amonium Phosphate - 2 Kg.

    Pls note I have rounded some of the numbers to the nearest kg and the dosage is for 1 ha.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Great to let me know the fretigation schedule
      Thank you very much..
      Ramesh

      Delete
    2. I am using Abda- Neemzol from Parry Agro and
      Humicil from Dow Chemicals .. FYIP
      along with fretilizers
      Regards
      Ramesh

      Delete