Authors : Punita Tiwari
Page Nos : 287-289
Description :
Coconut palm is an important plantation crop grown in 1.89 million ha in India supporting livelihood of many Indians. Coir industry is the important cottage industry related to coconut palm. Coir processing factory in India produce approximately 0.5 million tones of coir pith waste every year. The coir waste accumulates and creates an environmental hazard. Coir waste from coir fiber industries is processed into coco peat then used for horticultural and agricultural applications. Coco peat being resistant to bacterial and fungal growth also has high moisture retention and cation exchange capacity. Coco peat with such useful properties is not recommended for agricultural use alone due to its high lignin and cellulose contents. But if it is used in combination with other compost and organic manure it can prove to be an excellent culture medium, plant nutrient source and soil substitute in modern agricultural practices. The objective of the present work is to evaluate the efficiency of coco peat as soil substitute and to assess its quality by addition of organic compost. The experiment was performed in three different stages in plastic containers covered with agro net in open condition. The two treatments were T1- coco peat alone, T2- coco peat + compost. The vegetable crops such as brinjal, tomato and leafy vegetables were selected for the experiment. Growth of crop includes height and number of fruits and leafy cover of leafy vegetables. The healthy growth i. e. 77.8 cm height and 122 numbers of fruits per plant in brinjal and 96 cm and 46 fruits per plant were observed. Leafy vegetables also showed excellent leafy cover in each container. The present investigation concludes that combination of coco peat with other compost makes it an excellent media for soil less culture of vegetable crops. Physiochemical properties of the substrate also play important role in determining the growth of vegetable crop.
Keywords: coco peat, Physiochemical, cation, compost, coconut
