Weed Management Practices Affects Vegetative Growth and Graft Survival of Apple cv. Silver Spur/M9-T337 Nursery Plants

The present study aimed to evaluate the effect of different weed management practices on vegetative growth and graft survival of apple nursery. The experiment was laid out at the Experimental Farm, Division of Fruit Science, Faculty of Horticulture, Sher-e-Kashmir University of Agricultural Sciences and technology of Kashmir, Shalimar Campus, Srinagar, Jammu and Kashmir, India during the year 2020. Seven weed management practices i.e. T1 (manual weeding), T2 (pendimethalin @ 1 kg a.i. ha-1), T3 (pendimethalin @ 1 kg a.i. ha-1 + manual weeding), T4 (paddy straw mulch - 6cm thick), T5 (black polyethylene mulch - 200 micron), T6 (weed free) and T7 (weedy check) were tested in apple nursery (cv. Silver Spur grafted on M9-T337). The experimental design used was Randomized Complete Block Design with three replicates. Observations on vegetative growth parameters of nursery stocks (plant height, number of branches & number of leaves per plant, leaf area, rootstock girth and scion girth) and graft survival was recorded. Plant growth and graft survival percentage of apple nursery plants was significantly affected by weed management practices. Black polyethylene and paddy straw mulches resulted superior plant growth and both the treatments were statistically at par for all the vegetative growth parameters. Plant height (87.81cm), number of branches (0.4) and number of leaves (45.04) per plant and leaf area (23.63 cm-2) was maximum with black polyethylene much, while scion girth (3.26 cm) and rootstock girth (4.38 cm) was maximum with paddy straw mulch, Significantly maximum graft survival (90.60%) were recorded with black polyethylene. Hence, Black polyethylene (200 micron) found to be most effective weed management practice for obtaining higher graft survival of apple nursery plants with better plant growth characteristics.