Ecology, Environment and Conservation Paper

STUDIES ON EFFECT OF PLANT GROWTH REGULATORS ON VEGETATIVE GROWTH AND FLOWERING OF PAPAYA

A.F. Bhogave and U.A. Raut

Abstract

Experiment entitled, “studies on effect of plant growth regulators on vegetative growth and flowering of papaya” was conducted at Commercial Fruit Nursery, College of Horticulture, Dr. Panjabrao Deshmukh Krishi Vidyapeeth, Akola. The experiment was undertaken with objective to study the effect of different plant growth regulators on vegetative growth and flowering of papaya. The experiment was laid out in a Randomized Block Design with thirteen treatments and replicated thrice. The present study revealed that the vegetative growth of papaya plant in terms of plant height, number of leaves, flowering characters like total number of female and hermaphrodite flowers per plant increased by foliar application of gibberellic acid - GA3 (150 and 200 ppm). The foliar application of NAA found to be effective in respect of increasing plant height, total number of female and hermaphrodite flowers per plant next to GA--3 treatments. Reduced plant height, increasing the girth of stem and spread of plant had greatly influenced by 2, 3, 5 - triiodo benzoic acid - TIBA (150 and 200 ppm). Among the Plant growth regulators used, TIBA (150 and 200 ppm) proved to be best particularly in the reduction of number of days require to first flowering.