DefinePK

Abstract

Tomato is well known for its quality and nutritional value all over the world but untimely and imbalanced fertilizer application has a severe effect on yield & quality of tomato. To investigate the effect of specific timing of fertilizer application for off-season tomato (Sahel hybrid), a study was conducted at Nuclear Institute for Food and Agriculture (NIFA), Peshawar. Nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium (NPK) fertilizers were applied at the rate of 10-10-15 kg ha-1 at 7, 14 and 21 days intervals, starting after establishment of crop (30 days after transplanting) till mid of June. The current study was carried out under randomized complete block (RCB) design having three replicates of four treatments. The maximum fruit yield (2.94 t/ 10 Marla tunnel) was recorded in the treatment receiving NPK @ 10-10-15 kg ha-1 at 7 days interval that was significantly (P≤0.05) higher as compared to those fertilized at 14 days (1.75 t/ 10 Marla tunnel) and 21 days (0.83 t/ 10 Marla tunnel) intervals, while minimum (0.5 t/ 10 Marlas) was recorded in control. Maximum grade-A tomatoes having above 100 g weight per fruit (62%), density (1.30 g/cm3), chlorophyll content / SPAD value (57.63), total acidity (0.44%), protein content (15.4%), total soluble solids (5.4 °Brix),  N (1.25%), P (0.20%), K (1.45%) in fruit and improved shelf-life (9 days) were recorded with the NPK application at 7 days intervals. The concentration of vitamin C showed increasing trend along with decrease in N dose at all application times. This study suggested that application of timely and balanced fertilizer may be a good strategy to get higher and good quality yield of off-seasonally grown tomatoes in the tunnels.
Keywords: Chemical composition; Concentration; Mineral content; Nutrients; Sahel; Time interval
http://dx.doi.org/10.19045/bspab.2021.100152