ENHANCEMENT OF SEEDLING QUALITY IN SMALL CARDAMOM (ELETTARIA CARDAMOMUM MATON.) THROUGH INOCULATION OF VAM FUNGI AND LIQUID MICROBIAL INOCULANTS AS PGPRDivyabharathi, D., Ravi, C.S., Nandish, M.S., Ganapathi, M. and Raviraja Shetty, G.Abstract An experiment was carried out to evaluate the effect of liquid microbial inoculants on quality seedlings production in small cardamom at ZAHRS, Mudigere, Karnataka during 2020-21with nine treatments and three replications in CRD. The results of study revealed that, among the different treatments studied, combined inoculation of liquid PGPR (Azotobacter chroococcum, Bacillus megaterium, Bacillus mucilaginosus) and VAM recorded significantly maximum pseudostem height, pseudostem girth, number of leaves, leaf area, leaf area index, total chlorophyll content, total dry matter production, number of primary and secondary roots, root length, root thickness, root volume, total dry matter production, tillering percentage, Dickson quality index and volume index at 150 days after inoculation in the secondary nursery. Similarly, significantly higher microbial population in terms total bacteria, fungi and actinomycetes were observed in the nursery media with conjuctive use of liquid microbial inoculants and VAM. |