Effect of Planting Geometry on Seed and Oil Yield of Jatropha

Abstract

The present study was carried out for two consecutive years (2010 and 2011) at Student’s Experimental Farm, Sindh Agriculture University, Tandojam. The experiment was laid out in randomized complete block design factorial with three replications. Three Jatropha varieties i.e Thailand, Malaysian and Indian were used in the experiment under different planting geometries (2.15×2.15 m, 2.50×2.50 m and 2.15×3.00 m). The results revealed that effect of planting geometry on plant height, branches plant-1, days to harvest, fruits plant-1, seeds fruit-1, seed weight plant-1, seed index, seed yield (kg ha-1) and oil content (%) was found significant (P<0.05) statistically. The crop performance was maximum in planting geometry of 2.15m × 3.00 m with 524.9 fruits plant-1, 1661 kg ha-1 seed yield and 31.00 % oil content. Among varieties, Thai performed better than Malaysian and Indian varieties with highest values for plant height (255.7 cm), fruits plant-1 (533.2), seed yield (1905 kg ha-1) and oil content (32.6 %) respectively. The interactive effect of planting geometry 2.15×3.00 m × variety Thai × 2011 resulted in markedly higher crop performance as compared to rest of the treatment combinations, with maximum fruits plant-1 (697.5), seed weight plant-1 (1547 g), seed yield (2398 kg ha-1) and oil content (35.5 %). Being a perennial crop, overall, performance was better during the second year (2011) as compared to first year (2010) which is mainly associated with the one year increased age and development of the crop