D. Saritha, M. Rajkumar, R. Sendhilnathan and B. Sunil Kumar
Abstract
Tomato (Solanum lycopersicum L.) is a significant vegetable crop, popularly known for its utilization as an indispensable kitchen vegetable bearing high nutritional value and inherent health benefits. The worldâs rising population and mankindâs increased demand for tomato production has leveraged the use of Grafting tomatoes, a technique that not only allows for higher yields, but also favors pest resistance and reduced crop losses due to adverse environmental conditions. Thus, owing to the importance of tomato cultivation in todayâs world and the beneficial effects incurred by grafting, the field experiment was carried out during 2023-24 at Loyola farm, old Alwal, Secunderabad to evaluate the grafted tomato for growth and yield. The field experiment was conducted in Factorial Randomized Block Design with three replications with two Brinjal rootstocks and six tomato scions. The following characteristics of grafted and non-grafted were recorded. Plant height, No of Branches, Days to 50 % Flowering, No of Flowers per cluster, Number of fruits per plant, Average fruit weight, Fruit yield per plant, plot and hectare. The results showed that highest Plant height, more no of Branches, less Days to 50 % Flowering, more no of Flowers per cluster, more number of fruits per plant, Average fruit weight, Fruit yield per plant, plot and Hectare were improved by grafting with Solanum torvum followed by Utkarsha brinjal hybrid. The lowest values were recorded in non-grafted plants. Apositive effect of grafting was recorded with Solanum torvum followed by Utkarsha which were used as rootstock. Among all grafted combinations abhiman grafted on solanum torvum (R1S2), and US-440 grafted on Utkarsha recorded highest yied (89.38 t/ha, 68.69 t/ha) respectively. These results showed that grafting could be an advantageous alternative in tomato production.