Effect of Micronutrients Iron, Zinc and Boron on the Growth and Harvest of Onion (Allium cepa L.) cv. Agrifound Light Red

Indian soil has been chronically poor in nitrogen, phosphorus, iron, zinc, boron, magnesium and sulphur and due to continuous cropping, multiple nutrient deficiencies have been noticed. Zinc deficiency in onion is fairly wide spread and is noticed also in garlic in the sandy soils. Deficiency of iron in onion, garlic, brinjal, tomato and potato are also noticed in sandy soils. This experiment was undertaken to compare the effect of certain micronutrient on growth and development of onion. The experiment was laid out in factorial Randomized Block Design with twenty-seven treatments were conducted during rabi season of was conducted at Department of Vegetable Science, College of Horticulture, S. D. Agricultural University, Sardarkrushinagar. Sardarkrushinagar, India. The treatments were applied in the form of zinc sulphate, iron sulphate and borax. There were altogether 27 treatment combinations with viz., Iron (0, 20 and 40 kg/ha), Zinc (0, 25 and 50 kg/ha) and Boron (0, 2.5 and 5.0 kg/ha) from different source of FeSo4, ZnSo4 and borax were applied as soil application. The crop was fertilized with recommended doses of 100:50:50 NPK/ha for onion. The observations were made from the selected tagged 10 plants for each treatment. Statistical analysis was done by using standard techniques. The result revealed that the treatment i1 (20 kg iron/ha) significantly showed maximum plant height (22.20 cm and 68.64 cm) at 30 and 90 DAT, number of leaves per plant (4.16, 6.95 and 9.16) and neck thickness (0.61 cm, 1.41 cm and 2.23 cm at 30, 60 and 90 DAT, respectively), minimum neck thickness (1.20 cm) at the time of harvesting and minimum days taken to maturity (116.98) after transplanting. Significantly maximum plant stand in field (99.23 %) at 30 DAT, plant height (48.25 cm and 69.75 cm), number of leaves per plant (7.01 and 9.35 at 60 and 90 DAT, respectively) and neck thickness (0.63 cm and 2.28 cm at 30 and 90 DAT, respectively) and minimum days taken to maturity (118.20) after transplanting were recorded with treatment z1 (25 kg zinc/ha). Significantly maximum plant height (21.30 cm at 30 DAT), number of leaves per plant (3.95 and 6.79 at 30 and 60 DAT), neck thickness (2.20 cm at 90 DAT) as well as minimum neck thickness at the time of harvesting (1.22 cm) and per cent bolting (3.83 %) were recorded with treatment b2 (5.0 kg boron/ha). The treatment b1 (2.5 kg boron/ha) was found to have significantly maximum plant height (67.44 cm) and number of leaves per plant (8.89) at 90 DAT. It is concluded from present investigation, application of 20 kg iron/ha, 25 kg zinc/ha and 5.0 kg boron/ha should be achieved higher growth and growth parameters of onion in cultivar Agrifound Light Red.