Effect of sowing dates and variety on growth, yield attributes and yield of rapeseed under organic farming practices in south garo hills, meghalaya

A field experiment conducted in Asugre Village, South Garo Hills, in 2022 and 2023. Assessed the impact of sowing dates and rapeseed varieties on the growth and yield of Brassica juncea L. using a Factorial Randomized Block Design.The study included four sowing dates (15th September, 30th September, 15th October, and 30th October) and two rapeseed varieties (M 27 and TS 38), replicated over two years. Results revealed that sowing dates significantly influenced yield traits. The 30th September sowing (S2) yielded the longest siliqua (4.77 cm in 2022 and 4.75 cm in 2023) and the highest number of siliqua per plant (131.04 in 2022 and 130.93 in 2023). This date also resulted in the highest seed yield (10.50 q/ha in 2022 and 10.20 q/ha in 2023), followed by the 15th October (S3) and 30th October (S4) sowing dates. Variety TS 38 outperformed M 27 in key yield characteristics such as plant height, primary branches, siliqua length, and number of siliqua per plant. TS 38 produced higher seed yields of 1.08 t/ha in 2022 and 1.04 t/ha in 2023, compared to M 27. The interaction between sowing date and variety showed the best performance when TS 38 was sown on 30th September (V2S2), with the highest siliqua length (5.65 cm in 2022 and 5.63 cm in 2023), number of siliqua per plant (135.66 in 2022 and 135.50 in 2023), and seed yield (1.17 t/ha in 2022 and 1.13 t/ha in 2023).