YIELD AND ECONOMICS OF FOXTAIL MILLET (SETARIA ITALICA L.) AS INFLUENCED BY DIFFERENT FERTILIZER LEVELS AND ROW SPACINGS

A field experiment was carried out during kharif, 2023 at Experimental Farm, Department of Agronomy, College of Agriculture, Latur on clayey soil to find out the effect of fertilizer levels and row spacings on yield and economics of foxtail millet.The experiment was laid out in Factorial Randomized Block Design with two factors and replicated thrice.First factor consists of three fertilizer levels viz., F 1 -75 % RDF, F 2 -100 % RDF and F 3 -125 % RDF, second factor consists of three-row spacing viz., S 1 -22.5 cm 10 cm, S 2 -30 cm 10 cm and S 3 -45 cm 10 cm.The results revealed that application of 125 % RDF (F 3 ) recorded significantly higher number of panicles plant -1 (4.09), panicle length (21.40 cm), weight of panicle plant -1 (19.51 g), number of grains panicle -1 (2710), grain yield (2833 kg ha -1 ), test weight (4.23 g), gross monetary returns (153008) and net monetary returns (99840) which was comparable with 100 % RDF (F 2 ) and found significantly superior over 75 % RDF (F 1 ).Among row spacings, wider row spacing of 45 cm 10 cm (S 3 ) recorded significantly higher number of panicles plant -1 (3.90), panicle length plant -1 (20.88 cm), weight of panicle plant -1 , number of grains panicle -1 (2690) and test weight (4.21 g) closely followed by 30 cm x 10 cm.Grain yield (2829 kg ha -1 ), gross monetary returns (152775 ha -1 ) and net monetary returns (100848 ha -1 ) were highest with closer row spacing of 22.5 cm x10 cm (S 1 ) which was comparable with 30 cm 10 cm (S 2 ) and significantly superior over 45 cm 10 cm (S 3 ).