Effect of Vine Length and Organic Manures Application on Growth and Yield of Sweet Potatoes (Ipomoea Batatas L.) In Makurdi, Nigeria

The study was carried out at the Joseph Sarwuan Tarka University teaching and research farm located at (Latitude 7°49N, Altitude 07°52N and Longitude 08°36E). The study objective was evaluating different vine lengths and organic fertilizer types on the growth and yield attributes of sweet potato (Ipomoea batatas L) in Makurdi, Benue State. The experiment was 4 x 3 factorial treatment combinations laid out in a Randomized Complete Block Design (RCBD) replicated thrice. The treatments were sweet potato vines cut at different vine lengths of 20cm, 25cm, 30cm and 40cm and three organic fertilizer types of cow dung, poultry manure and goat manures at the rate of 5 t/ha and control. Data collected was subjected to Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) using GENSTAT statistical software version 17. The study results revealed significant variations among the vine length and organic fertilizer types. The vine length of 40cm had higher number of leaves (140.23), number of branches (5.87), vine length (110.12), leaf area (86.89), tuber weight (237.21), tuber number per plant (4.67), tuber diameter (21.32) and yield (12.56) and application of poultry manure showed superior performance on all the parameters evaluated as compared to other organic manure types and the control. From the result obtained it can be concluded that sweet potato should be planted with a 40cm vine length and the application of poultry manure at 5t/ha for optimum sweet potato yield in Makurdi, Benue State.