Evaluation of High Yielding Groundnut Varieties for North Transitional Zone of Karnataka State, India

Groundnut (Arachishypogaea L.) is an important oil seed crop grown in the arid andsemi-aridtropics of India under rainfed condition. The productivity is around 800 kg ha-1 in Karnataka as against national productivity of 1500 kg ha-1. The reasons for low productivity are many among them lack of improved variety in groundnut cultivation. Hence, study conducted to evaluate the high yielding groundnut varieties on farmers filed under farmers participatory mode approach. On field 25 FLD’s were planned by AICRP on Groundnut, MARS, UAS, Dharwad, Karnataka on farmers’ participatory mode approach under National Mission on Oilseeds and Oil Palm(NMOOP) programme and were conducted during kharif2021 with 25 farmers from Dharwad district. Each farmers field was considered as replication (25 no.) with 5 varieties as treatments and data was analysed statistically using Randomized complete block design. Statistical significance was tested with F test at 5 per cent level of probability. The study revealed that Dh-256(2850 kg ha-1) and K-1812 (Kadri Lepaxi) (2745 kg ha-1) recorded statistically on far dry pod yield. However, Dh-256 numerically out yielded K-1812 to the extent of 105 kg ha-1. Haulm yield when compared to the other varieties. A significant reduction in stem rot incidence was observed with respect to Dh-256(3.5%), K-1812(3.8%), G2-52(4.5%) and GPBD-4(4.7%) when compared to JL-24(8.1%) which resulted significant reduction plant population of JL-24 at harvest though it was having higher harvest index. The additional cost of cultivation of Rs. 2000 was spent on JL-24 to manage foliar diseases. Significantly higher gross returns were of Rs.148405 ha-1 and Rs.143460 ha-1, respectively by cultivating Dh-256 and K-1812 as against Rs.115740 ha-1 and Rs. 98728 ha-1 of local improved popular variety GPBD-4 and farmers check variety JL-24, respectively. From the results, farmers were very satisfied with Dh-256 and K-1812 newly released varieties of UAS, Dharwad, Karnataka and ARS, Kadiri, Andhra Pradesh. During, kharif2021, groundnut crop growth season was normal (496 mm from South West Monsoon i.e., June to September) for the Dharwad district and it was 4% higher than normal rainfall of 479 mm for the same period in the region, Further, groundnut crop not suffered due to dry spell any point of its growing period.