FEASIBILITY OF USING DRONE FOR FOLIAR SPRAYING OF NUTRIENTS IN IRRIGATED GREEN GRAM (VIGNA RADIATA L.)K. Dayana, T. Ramesh, S. Avudaithai, S. Paul Sebastian and S. RathikaAbstract An experiment was conducted at Anbil Dharmalingam Agricultural College and Research Institute, Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, Tiruchirappalli during summer, 2021 to study the feasibility of using drone for foliar spray of nutrients on growth attributes, yield and economics of green gram. Experiment was laid out in randomized block design with 7 treatments and three replications. The treatments consisted two levels of TNAU pulse wonder (1% and 2%), two levels of drone spray fluid requirement (30 and 50 liters ha- 1) along with manual spray (1% and 2% of TNAU pulse wonder with 500 liters ha-1 spray fluid) and control. The results revealed that significantly higher growth characters such as plant height (56.2), number of branches plant-1 (4.12), leaf area index (4.48), dry matter production (2961 kg ha-1), yield attributes viz., number of pods plant-1 (39.2), number of seeds pod-1 (11.0), pod length (8.33 cm), pod weight (0.64 g), grain yield (747 kg ha-1), haulm yield (1684 kg ha-1) and economics such as gross returns (Rs. 53784 ha-1), net returns (Rs. 28648 ha-1), benefit cost ratio (2.14) were recorded with spray of 2% TNAU pulse wonder using drone with spray fluid of 50 litres ha-1 compared to manual spray and control. Thus, it is concluded that agricultural drone could be feasibly used for spraying of 2% pulse wonder with spray fluid of 50 litres ha-1 at peak flowering stage to increase productivity and profitability of green gram. |