Efficacy of Mixed Fertilizers (NPK) and Gibberellic Acid (GA3) Solution on Growth and Yield of Quality Tomato (Lycopersicon esculentum Mill.)

Tomato is one of the most important edible and nutritious vegetable crops cultivating with different fertilizers management in Bangladesh. Thus, investigation was carried out so as to identify the effect of mixed fertilizers (NPK) and gibberellic acid (GA₃) on growth, yield and yield contributing characters of quality tomato at the farm of horticulture in the Department of Crop Science and Technology, University of Rajshahi during the period from October, 2018 to March, 2019. The two factors experiment included four levels of mixed fertilizers( NPK) viz., F₀ (0 kg N/ha + 0 kg P/ha + 0 kg K/ha),  F1(200 kg N/ha + 100 kg P/ha + 160 kg K/ha), F₂ (225 kg N/ha + 125 kg P/ha + 180 kg K/ha) and F₃ (250 kg N/ha + 150 kg P/ha + 200 kg K/ha, and  three(3) levels of GA₃ solution viz., 0 , 50 and 70 ppm, respectively. The trial was designed in Randomized Complete Block Design (RCBD) with three (3) replications. The results indicated that the most of the parameters studied (viz., plant height, number of leaves per plant, number of branches per plant, number of flowers clusters per plant, number of flowers per cluster, number of fruit clusters per plant, number of fruits per plant, fruit diameter, fruit yield (t/ha) were found highly significant as influenced by different mixed fertilizers (NPK) as well as GA3 solutions The highest tomato yield (41.33 t/ha) was recorded from 225 kg N/ha+125 kg P/ha+180 kg K/ha and the lowest yield (35.89 t/ha) was recorded from control. The response of GA₃ solution was found to be significant in all the characters of tomato and the highest yield (41 t/ha) was recorded from 50 ppm GA3 solution, while the lowest yield (37.17 t/ha) was recorded from control. The combined effect of mixed fertilizers (NPK) and GA₃ solution were found to be significant in most of the characters studied. The highest yield (44 t/ha) was achieved from 225 kg N/ha + 125 kg P/ha + 180 kg K/ha along with 50 ppm GA3 solution while the lowest yield (34 t/ha) was recorded from control. So, it can be concluded that 225 kg N/ha + 125 kg P/ha + 180 kg K/ha along with 50 ppm GA₃ solution is found suitable combination as it shows better performance for growth, yield and yield contributing characters of quality tomato. Therefore, our farmers may adopt this combination for quality tomato production.

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Keywords: Mixed Fertilizer (NPK); Gibberellic Acid; Growth; Yield; Tomato.