The Farmers Field School (FFS) is a successful extension tool adopted in many parts of the country in transfer of technologies to rural people. This may be due to its strengths like seed to seed technology approach, learning by doing and group influence. Krishi Vigyan Kendra, Dakshina Kannada organized a need based Farmer Field School to effectively transfer technology of Integrated Crop Management in water melon. The lead farmer was identified and 20 fellow farmers were also selected for the FFS. The curriculum for FFS was drawn based on the constraints identified in the focused group discussion and preliminary survey. Ten sessions on cultivation practices of watermelon was organized during the crop period. Field day was organized to share the experiences of lead farmer with fellow farmers. The lead farmer recorded yield of 36.75t/ha in FFS plot compared to 24.0 t/ha in check plot which was an increase by 54 percent.

The present investigation was carried out to study the chalidid species diversity in Horticultural ecosystem at Horticultural Research Station, Thadiyankudisai, Dindigul, Tamil Nadu from January, 2018 to January, 2019. A total of 257 numbers of individuals were recorded under 4 families, 9 genera and 10 species. The seasonal abundance studies revealed that the highest population of species was recorded in South West Monsoon (SWM) (52.9%) followed by winter season (32.7%) and the least number of species during North East Monsoon (NEM) (5.8%). The species diversity comprised of Copidosoma floridamum (24.5%) followed by Dipara sp. (13.2%), Brachymeria jambolana (10.9%), Agarwalencyrtus citri (10.5%), Gonatocerus sp. (10.1%) and (Lymaenon delhiensis and Epitranus sp.) (7.8%). The least population was recorded in Haltichella sp (3.5%). Insect pests are a major constraint in achieving higher yields in Horticulture, hence, the studies of Chalcidoidea diversity is crucial for success in biological control.

This paper is attempted to analyze the economics of layer farms in Namakkal district of Tamil Nadu. The study is based on primary data collected using questionnaires from 90 layer farmers. The farmers were classified into two categories viz., Group I (Below 50000 birds) and Group II (Above 50000 birds). Cost and return analysis and Garrett ranking technique were employed to analyze the data. The results revealed that, the total investment and cost of production per 1000 birds were significantly higher in group II farms for about 3.82 lakhs and Rs. 27777. Average net income per 1000 birds was higher in group II farms for about Rs. 39436. Net return per bird was found to be significantly higher in group II which indicates the economies of scale of production. High feed cost, disease outbreak and high mortality rate were the major constraint faced by the farmers in the study area.

The study was carried out for analysing polymorphism of Cytochrome b (cyt b) gene of Doom pig and certain other exotic breed of pig found in Assam, and development of a RFLP based marker targeting the cytochrome b (cyt b) gene of Doom pig. An attempt was made by evaluating a partial cytochrome b (cyt b) gene sequence of 474 bp to differentiate Doom pig from other exotic animals in Assam. The PCR product was digested using the enzyme Stu I. Although the 474 bp fragment of the cyt b gene under study could not be used as an effective RFLP marker to identify the Doom pigs of Assam but two potential SNPs were detected at position 14944 and 15165 upon sequence analysis which could be used to differentiate Doom pigs from exotic breeds, viz. Hampshire and Yorkshire. The pair wise distance of partial cytochrome b gene at nucleotide levels revealed 99.3% and 99% identity of Doom pig with Hampshire and Yorkshire pigs, respectively. The study indicates that Doom pigs are closely related to Hampshire breed of pigs as revealed upon phylogenetic analysis.

Dryland horticulture is completely dependent on the monsoonal rainfall for its crop success. Chilli crop cultivation proves to be remunerative in a rainfed region like Thoothukudi district of South Tamil Nadu where the major rainfall contribution is from North-East monsoon. The influence of seasonal rainfall variability on chilli was explored through correlating the inter-seasonal rainfall deviation with chilli productivity using the 30 years (1983-2012) rainfall and chilli productivity data. Results indicated that chilli productivity had the relationship with seasonal rainfall by 45 percent. The study further revealed that chilli crop yield dropped in five out of 10 dry rainfall years and excess rainfall years also reduced the yield of chilli crop. It could be understood from the results that low and high rainfall years adversely affect the yield of chilli crop.

Pineapple is one of the largely grown fruits in the North Eastern States of India. However, the demand of pineapple from Manipur is higher than the other states since it has a very distinctive taste and flavour as compared to the other states’ varieties. The present study was conducted with a view to analyze the growth in area, production and productivity of pineapple in Manipur. The growth in the area, production and productivity of pineapple in Manipur was estimated using the compound growth rate and percentage change in this study. The necessary secondary data were collected for a period of 12 years from 2005-06 to 2016-2017.The compound growth rate indicates positive and significant growth in volume of pineapple in the state. The area, production and productivity were observed in the selected districts, so as the growth rate with respect to state as a whole is positive which registered a positive growth rate of nearly 1.26 percent in area, 2.43 percent in production and 1.16 percent in productivity of pineapple respectively. The high growth rate in area and production is because of the increase in the area under pineapple cultivation.

Maize (Zea mays L.) is an important cereal crop of India and plays pivotal role in agricultural economy both as staple food for larger section of population, raw materials for industries and feed for animals. In India the need of maize is very much rising in every year which when it’s compared with production. One of the reasons often attributed to decline in maize productivity is poor production practices, awareness and characterized by low use of modern inputs. In order to avoid the lack of all the above to assess the current levels of technical efficiency of maize cultivation like spacing of Maize cultivation with effective management of irrigation practices could be taken as a study. The experiment was conducted in Summer 2015 through IW/CPE ratio with three different spacing. The irrigation was scheduled at 1.0, 0.8 & 0.6 IW/CPE (Irrigation Water / Cumulative Pan Evaporation) ratio were practiced for irrigation and three plant spacing were adopted viz., 40 x 40 cm, 30 x 30 cm & 60 x 25 cm for the study. The maize seed was sown with the spacing of 40 x 40 cm, 30 x 30 cm & 60 x 25 cm on the ridges of furrows. The irrigation intervals were decided on the basis of daily pan evaporation data which would met with the ratios of 1.0, 0.8 & 0.6. Hence, the irrigation of the field can vary from 5 – 10 days depending on a number of factors such as soil type, weather and crop growth stage. Fertilizes was uniformly applied to all the treatments as per 100 % RDF. The highest grain yield (7431 kg/ha) and maximum WUE (14.09 kg/ha-mm) was obtained with irrigation at IW/CPE 0.8 in 60 x 25 cm spacing which consumed 400 mm of irrigation water in 8 irrigations. This was followed by IW/CPE 0.8 in 30 x 30cm spacing with the WUE of 13.66 kg/ha mm which also consumed 400 mm in 8 irrigations. The lowest grain yield was recorded with irrigation at IW/CPE ratio of 0.6 in 40 x 40 cm spacing with the WUE of 11.55 kg/ha mm which consumed 350 mm of irrigation water in 7 numbers of irrigations.

The field experiment was carried out during summer season of 2017 at the Instructional Farm, Department of Agronomy, College of Agriculture, JAU, Junagadh. The experiment comprising 12 treatments was laid out in randomized block design with three replications. Besides, weed free condition, Two HW at 20 and 40 DAS, Quizalofop-ethyl 40 g/ha as post-emergence at 20 DAS fb 1 HW at 40 DAS and Pendimethalin 750 g/ha as pre-emergence fb 1HW at 30 DAS were found more effective in reducing the weed population up to harvest and resulted in less dry weight of weeds, lower weed index and higher weed control efficiency and significantly higher values ofprotein, oil, N, P and K content in crop.

Blockchain is contributing many promising advances in the areas of food safety. Food safety has become an important food quality attribute. The significant problem of food safety, it is directly rendering people’s health and safety. For an effective means of product quality, safety management blockchain traceability technology has used for monitoring the process. Numerous emerging internet technologies have been applied in traceability systems of food products. This study introduces the concept of Blockchain technology that can be applied within food traceability, control and its implication. A general framework for IT architecture for tracking food items in the supply chain is discussed. The blockchain and Internet of things, which could provide an information platform for all the supply chain members with openness, transparency, neutrality, reliability and security. The study concludes with a challenge to adopt blockchain technology in the future food supply chain traceability systems are discussed.

Plant faces several drought stress impacts on growth and development during its life period. Due to this, the agricultural production has become decreased which lead to insufficient to meet peoples economic demand during the upcoming years. Scientist has developed several mitigation strategies. In this screening of drought tolerant genotypes is important for the creation of tolerant varieties to face the problem. An experiment was conducted in pearl millet genotypes to study the physiological and biochemical changes under drought stress in glass house, Department of Crop Physiology, TNAU, Coimbatore. Drought stress was imposed at panicle emergence stage. The physiological and biochemical parameters like gas exchange parameters like transpiration and photosynthetic rate, chlorophyll characters like chlorophyll index (SPAD), chlorophyll content and chlorophyll fluorescence and yield characters were recorded. The pearl millet genotypes show significant variation under drought stress. Among the ten peal millet genotypes PT 5721 and PT 5746 shows the superior performance in drought stress. Likewise, the genotype PT 5756 recorded much lower tolerance capacity to withstand under drought stress.

The presented study was conducted in north coastal Andhra Pradesh based on the primary data collected from 400 farmers and secondary data on farming situations existing in the zone. The zone totally had 20 farming situations across the three districts viz., Srikakulam, Vizianagaram and Visakhapatnam. The crop and allied activities like dairy, poultry and sheep & goat rearing were considered for the study. The BCR was high in FS-III (1.27), FS-IV (1.38) and FS-VI (1.31) of Srikakulam, Vizianagaram and Visakhapatnam districts respectively. The results further confirmed that the farming systems with allied activities along with crops were more profitable than cropping alone. The farming systems with sheep & goat rearing yielded more returns than any other farming systems. Response Priority Index (RPI) was used to rank the production constraints of farming systems. Scarcity of labour and high production cost were the major constraints identified through response priority index (RPI).

Bracon hebetor Say (Hymenoptera : Braconidae), is a larval parasitoid of various lepidopteran hosts. It also acts as a menace in biocontrol laboratories by completely parasitizing the laboratory host Corcyra cephalonica (Stainton). A study was conducted to determine the effect of host instars of C. cephalonica on the parasitism behaviour of B. hebetor. A gravid female parasitoid was selected to study the host selection behaviour in different instar larva. Ethograms were constructed for the host parasitisation behaviour of B. hebetor on each instar of corcyra larva which illustrates the transition between the different behavioural events. The duration of each behavioural step was calculated. The results showed that the parasitoid showed significant ovipositional behaviour from the 3rd instar onwards and was the maximum in 6th instar. The duration of host acceptance between each instar differs significantly. The maximum duration was occupied by standing still irrespective of the instars.

Astrometeorology is a great science gifted by our ancestors, provides opportunity to predict accurate weather in advance without time limit. In Tamil Nadu Agricultural University (TNAU), Astromet weather forecast rules for rain and wind speed were already defined. In continuation of Astromet research on rainfall and wind speed, identification of Astromet rules for the extreme weather events particularly Cyclone events had been taken up during 2018-19 at Agro climate Research Centre, TNAU, Coimbatore. Six hourly cyclone data observed from 1990 to 2016 over Bay of Bengal (BOB) were correlated with the ephemeris developed for the same period in Alcyone ephemeris calculator. The results of the study inferred that the cyclone events were concentred between the azimuth range of 61-120 and 240-300, irrespective of planet positions. The planets viz., Uranus, Mars, Saturn, Neptune and Jupiter had higher influence on cyclone events than other planets. In the above said azimuth, the Depression category events were highly influenced by the planets viz., Uranus (67.9%), Mars (66.4%), Saturn (66.1%), Neptune (65.9%), and Jupiter (65.3%). The Deep Depression category events were highly influenced by Jupiter (67.6%), Saturn (66.8%), Uranus (65.6%), and Mars (64.9%). The cyclone storm events were influenced by the planets viz., Neptune (70.1%), Saturn (69.4%), Uranus (68.6%), Moon (68.0%), and Jupiter (67.4%), whereas the influence on Severe Cyclonic Storm category was by the planets viz., Moon (74.6%), Uranus (71.0%), Saturn (68.4%), Mercury (66.8%), and Mars (66.3%) under the above said azimuth range. The earlier Astromet study also inferred the influence of Moon, Saturn and Neptune on rainfall events and Mercury, Mars, Uranus and Saturn on wind speed events under same azimuth. Since, the cyclone is a combination of wind and rainfall, these planets also have good influence on the cyclone events. The conclusion derived from the investigation is that the planets have good influence on cyclone events at varied levels. Most of the cyclone events (59 to 75%) were observed between the azimuth range of 61-120 and 241-300 degrees of cyclone influencing planet such as Saturn, Uranus, Moon, Mercury, and Venus.

Sand, an important constituent of concrete, has growing demand worldwide. Sand mining is the process of removal of sand particles from the natural eco system. In Tamil Nadu, 60 percent of the sand requirement is met by the quarries in Cauvery river basin. River sand mining can cause damages to both eco system and the livelihood of the people. Through literature, it was observed that the farmers in the riverine area are facing serious water shortage problems due to mining activities. As a result, the share of agriculture income to the farm households has been decreasing. Hence, an attempt has been made to analyze the effect of sand mining on farm income in lower Cauvery river basin of Tamil Nadu using decomposition analysis. The income differences were analyzed for two time periods 2010-11 and 2017-18 for the major crops in study area viz., Paddy and Banana. The analysis resulted that the contribution of sand mining in the income differences was at higher level in paddy and banana (46.56 and 26.60 percent respectively) in the study area.

Crop residues and Farm Yard Manure (FYM) are the most important sources of soil organic carbon and releases nutrients that help to maintain the soil fertility. A pot culture experiment was conducted in Temperature Control Chamber (TCC) at Agro Climate Research Centre (ACRC), Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, Coimbatore to study the nutrient release pattern of organic matter under projected climate change viz., elevated temperature (+2ºC) and moisture stress (drought - 60% ET, Excess - 140%) in addition with microbial addition. Necessary control viz., ambient temperature and no moisture stress (100%ET) was maintained under FCRD design with two replications. The study on impact of elevated temperature, moisture stress and microbial addition on organic matter decomposition and nitrogen release pattern could be concluded that the nitrogen release pattern was decreased with the elevated temperature and moisture stress. The elevated temperature stress could be sustained by proper soil moisture management and the addition of microbes could sustain the drought stress. Farm Yard Manure (FYM) releases more nitrogen than stover under ambient and elevated temperature (+2ºC), due to quicker microbial action. The stover releases the nitrogen slowly and the N availability increased after 60 DAI under both ambient and elevated temperature without moisture stress. This study had demonstrated that FYM would increase the nitrogen availability under elevated temperature and moisture stress than stover.

Laboratory experiments were conducted to evaluate the effect of Tomatine on subterranean termites, nematodes and soil borne pathogens. At 12 HAT (Hours After Treatment) Chlorpyriphos 1000 ppm recorded the highest mortality (100 %) of subterranean termite, Odontotermes wallonensis followed by Tomatine 1000 ppm (99.00 % mortality). Cent percent mortality of Meloidogyne incognita juveniles (j2) was observed in Tomatine (1 g / lit) at 36 HAT. Tomatine 1.0 g / lit recorded nil percent hatching of eggs upto 30 HAT. The same treatment recorded the lowest egg hatching of 1.45 percent at 36 HAT. Lowest mean mycelial growth of soil borne pathogens, Sclerotium rolfsii (5.10 %), Fusarium solani (4.00%) and Pythium aphanidermatum (5.60%) was recorded in Tomatine 1.0 % treatment

The aim of the present study was to compare milk for any significant difference in chemical composition between crossbred cows (HFX) and indigenous cows (Deoni), . Milk samples were taken from six Holstein-Friesian crossbred cows and six Deoni cows. Results of investigation showed no significant difference in milk components between Deoni cows and HF crossbred cows. However, in this study Total solids were numerically higher in milk from Deoni cows than HF crossbred cows which resulted primarily from higher milk yield in Holstein-Friesian crossbred cows than Deoni cows, on p>0.1 level. These facts point out that there is no greater advantage in Deoni cow milk with respect to chemical composition ,however, since Deoni cows are indigenous cow breed that produces A1 milk is having more health benefits when compared to A2 milk from HFX cows.

Non-thermal plasma can effectively facilitate microbial inactivation while maintaining the product quality due to its low temperature operation. This study investigates the effect of non-thermal plasma on physical quality parameters (weight loss and firmness) and microbial safety (total plate count) of orange segments. A low-pressure DC glow discharge device operated at different power levels of 10, 20, and 30 W was used for non-thermal plasma treatment of orange segments with exposure times of 5, 10, 15, and 20 min. After plasma treatment, the total plate count of orange segments significantly reduced from an initial population of 5.6 log CFU/g. The inactivation efficiency was found to increase with both treatment power and exposure time. The measurements on physical quality parameters showed significant differences between the treatments. The results implicate the potential of non-thermal plasma treatment to decontaminate orange segments but quality changes must be considered to guarantee consumer’s acceptance.

Rice (Oryza sativa L.) is the primary staple food source for more than half of the world’s population and has a profound influence on the livelihood of farmers. Lowland rice in tropical and subtropical regions can be detected precisely and its crop growth can be tracked effectively through Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) imagery, especially where cloud cover restricts the use of optical imagery. The SAR time-series data has been processed by fully automated processing chain in MAPscape-Rice software was used to convert the multi-temporal SAR data into terrain-geocoded σ° values, underwent a series of basic processing steps to generate terrain-geocoded σ° values suitable for analysis. Then the multi-temporal stack was analyzed using a rule-based classifier to detect rice areas. The DNDC model is one of the few agro-ecosystem models which simulate CO2, CH4, N2O, yield etc. The spatial variability in model yields was well detected based on the detailed soil data and an accurate rice area map. Rice yield derived based on rice area using Sentinel-1A SAR data and DNDC model integrates environmental factors and predicts yield depending on all model input data, whereas the RS method mainly considers in-season crop information. Based on the Rice area, the RS-derived yield represents a response to the environmental factors and human activities which may exceed the DNDC capability. The simulated rice yield for the monitoring locations was found to be in the range of 3553 to 4311 kg ha-1 whereas the observed yields were at 3288 to 5472 kg ha-1. The agreement ranges between DNDC simulated and observed yields were 78.2 to 92.8 percent.

Finger millet (Eluesine coracana. L.) is an important dry land millet crop and ranks third in importance among millets in India, after sorghum and pearl millet. For maintaining fertility status of soil on a long run, we should dependent on the different nutrient sources rather than single source chemical fertilizers. Ragi responds well to the integration of different nutrient sources which were imposed during preceding rice crop. The carry over effect of residual fertility was more beneficial to ragi to attain higher growth and yield parameters and yield of ragi.

Global climate model uses dynamical downscaling technique for projecting large-scale atmospheric process at local boundary condition. RegCM 4.4 is effectively used for downscaling the MIROC5 global climate model output, used for simulations and projecting the climate for Tamil Nadu under Representative Concentration Pathways (RCPs) 4.5 and 8.5 scenarios. On the basis of the MIROC5 model scenarios, the maximum temperature, minimum temperatures and rainfall are projected. The increase in maximum temperature is projected to be 1.0°C for RCP 4.5 and RCP 8.5 respectively during 2021to 2030. The minimum temperature is expected to increase about 1.1°C for RCP4.5 and RCP 8.5 respectively. Rainfall deviation would be 4.2 percent and 6.6 percent for RCP 4.5 and RCP 8.5 from base period.

Water scarcity presents the century’s biggest challenge for humankind. Most fresh water in the world (roughly two-thirds) is used for growing crops. Agriculture thus is the largest sink for freshwater in the world. So, the most important challenge in agriculture is irrigation, which consumes 70 percent of the world’s fresh water [8]. Water scarcity directly translates in to food security. It is therefore required to adopt efficient technologies so as to improve the water use efficiency by making efficient utilization of water to produce more crop with minimum amount of water. Scientific irrigation scheduling can serve a lot in this regard to avoid the wastage of the precious water resource as well as to improve the productivity of the crops. In this context, a field investigation entitled "Response of upland irrigated rice varieties to irrigations” was conducted at, Dr Panjabrao Deshmukh Krishi Vidyapeeth, Akola during the Kharif season of 2016-2017. The main plot treatments were: - Irrigation at 0.6, 0.8, 1.0 and 1.2 IW/CPE and subplot treatments consisted of four varieties: Avishkar, Parag, Sindewahi-1 and PBNR-03-02. The experimental results revealed that the rice varieties performed best at 1.2 IW/CPE, in which irrigation water was provided when cumulative pan evaporimeter reading reached 50 mm. The grain yield ,biological yield as well as water use efficiency was found to be the highest in irrigation at 1.2 IW/CPE and the variety Avishkar performed the best under the upland condition of the region in terms of yield as well as water use efficiency.