Biometric Response of Sugarcane Genotypes at Different Planting Times under Semi-Arid Climatic Conditions of Faisalabad

Pakistan is one of the most effected countries in the world that is mist affected by climatic change. Due to rapid change in climatic conditions, the sowing time of crops have been suffering drastically. Under the current scenario the old sowing times are causing decline the crop growth and yield. In order to study the planting times, a two-year field study was conducted at Sugarcane Research Institute, Faisalabad during 2020 and 2021 to evaluate the effect of different planting times on the crop growth, cane yield and cane quality attributes of sugarcane. Treatment includes two sugarcane varieties and seven sowing dates ranging from 15-August, 15-September, 15-October, 15-November, 15-January, 15-February, 15-March, 30-March. The Layout of experiment was RCBD (split plot) with net plot size of 4 m × 8.4 m and with three replications. Results revealed that early planting significantly enhanced crop performance compared to late sowing. A Significant decrease were noted across all parameters in both varieties at 15-March and 30-March. There is a decrease in germination (38.84%, 38.12%), tillers (55.48%, 51.50%), number of millable canes (46.33%, 44.09%), cane yield (55.63%, 53.80%), sugar recovery (10.47%, 58.75%) and sugar yield (62.24%, 10.34%) at 30 march planting date in CPF-250 as compared with 15 September planting time. There is a increase in germination (40.14%, 38.62%), tillers (48.89%, 45.83%), number of millable canes (34.24%, 32.64%), cane yield (49.90%, 47.11%), sugar recovery (57.17%, 54.62%) and sugar yield (14.40%, 14.21%) at 30 march planting date in CPF-252, as compared with 15 September planting time. It is concluded that sowing of CPF-250 and CPF-252 at 15-september is optimum planting date to get maximum sugarcane productivity and sugar yield under semi-arid agro-climatic conditions of Faisalabad.