Vol. 6, Issue 3 (2018)

The results revealed that two hand weeding was the most effective method for weed control next to weed free. At harvest however, significantly lowest density and dry weight of all weed species were recorded with two hand weeding at 20 & 40 DAS followed by pendimethalin @ 0.75 kg/ha as pre-emergence + HW at 40 DAS that remained statistically at par with oxyfluorfen @ 0.15 kg/ha as pre-emergence + HW at 40 DAS and imazethapyr @ 0.075 kg/ha as post-emergence at 20 DAS + HW at 40 DAS. Significantly highest weed control efficiency (83.03%) was achieved under two hand weeding at 20 & 40 DAS with lowest weed index (5.49 %) closely followed by pendimethalin @ 0.75 as pre-emergence + HW at 40 DAS (80.84%) with weed index (6.93%) and significantly highest herbicidal efficiency index (66.03%). Significantly highest values of growth parameters viz., plant height, number of branches per plant, number of leaves per plant and dry matter of plant and yield attributes viz., number of pods per plant, length of pod, number of seeds per pod and test weight along with seed and stover yield as well as protein content and protein yield were recorded under weed free over weedy check, which was comparable and significantly not different from two hand weeding at 20 & 40 DAS and pendimethalin @ 0.75 as pre-emergence + HW at 40 DAS.

The economics of weed management treatments also indicated that pendimethalin @ 0.75 kg/ha as pre-emergence + HW at 40 DAS was most profitable in terms of significantly higher net returns ( 27162/ha) and B: C ratio (1.94) with lowest weed index (6.93%) followed by two hand weeding at 20 & 40 DAS ( 27045/ha and 1.91) over weedy check ( 9092/ha 9092/ha and 1.36).