Abstract
A two-season study was carried out at the Teaching and Research field of the Department of Crop Science, University of Nigeria, Nsukka, to test the effect of varying poultry manure rates on the growth of sesame in Nsukka agro-ecology. Four research questions and four null hypotheses formed in line with the specific objectives guided the study. Three rates of poultry manure (0, 5 and 10 tonnes/ha) were tested. The experiment was laid out in a 3 x 3 x 2 factorial experiment in a randomized complete block design in three replications. The population is 1,350 sesame plants in the field. 135 sesame plants were sampled for data collection. Mean was used to answer the research question while Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) was used to test the hypothesis at 0.05 level of significant. A combined analysis was used to test effect of season at early and late planting. The result revealed that the application of 5 tonnes of poultry manure per ha significantly recorded the highest mean value of growth attributes such as plant height, stem girth, number of leaves /plant number of branches/plant, days to 1st flowering and days to 50% flowering. The result also revealed that establishing sesame plant during the early planting season produced significantly higher plant growth. The study concludes that there are possibilities of getting higher yield using lesser rates of poultry manure, lesser number of weeding and early planting and thus, recommended 5 tonnes of poultry manure per ha for maximum growth, weeding once at 3 weeks after planting early planting if arrangement is made for drying the capsules. It was also recommended that the Ministry of Agriculture, Agricultural Education experts and extension agents should encourage farmers in Nsukka agro-ecology to go into sesame production.
Keywords: Sesame, poultry manure, seasons, sustainability and agro-ecology.
Publication Date: 2023-09-09