AGRONOMIC EVALUATION OF OAT (AVENA SATIVA L.) GENOTYPES FOR FORAGE YIELD, QUALITY AND ECONOMICS UNDER VARYING LEVELS OF NITROGEN
R. S. SHEORAN, SATPAL*, U. N. JOSHI, B. S. DUHAN1, P. KUMARI, S. ARYA AND D. S. PHOGAT
Forage Section, Department of Genetics & Plant Breeding
CCS Haryana Agricultural University,
Hisar-125 004 (Haryana), India
*(e-mail : satpal.fpj@gmail.com)
(Received : 23 February 2017; Accepted : 11 May 2017)
SUMMARY
A field experiment was conducted at CCS Haryana Agricultural University, Hisar (Haryana) during winter season (rabi) of 2015-16 to study the response of different nitrogen levels on the yield and quality of oat (Avena sativa L.) genotypes. Eleven oat genotypes viz., RO-11-1, JO-04-18, OL-1689, SKO-198, SKO-199, RSO-8, OL-1804, OS-406, Kent, OS-6 and OL-125 were tested at three nitrogen levels i. e. 40, 80 and 120 kg nitrogen per hectare. Among the various genotypes, OL-1689 proved to be significantly superior for green fodder (369.3 q/ha) and dry matter yield (71.6 q/ha) to rest of the entries except OS-406 (336.0 q/ha GFY and 67.1 q/ha DMY) which remained statistically at par. Growth parameters, green fodder and dry matter were influenced significantly with increasing levels of nitrogen from 40 to 120 kg/ha, whereas plant height and tillers per metre row length were increased up to 80 kg N/ha only. Crude protein content and its yield increased significantly with increasing levels of nitrogen, maximum with 120 kg N/ha. Among genotypes, the maximum gross returns (Rs. 46162.5/ha), net returns (Rs. 18264.3/ha) and B : C ratio (1.65) were recorded with OL-1689, whereas the application of 120 kg nitrogen/ha recorded the maximum gross returns (Rs. 38625.0/ha), net returns (Rs. 10245.5/ha) and B : C ratio (1.36).
Key words: Oat, forage yield, dry matter, nitrogen, crude protein, net returns