Adoption of improved practices of pigeonpea

The study was conducted in three villages namely Tunakot Sera, Ghuna and Kuwanli selected randomly from Almora and Nainital districts of Uttarakhand to assess the awareness and the extent of adoption of recommended practices by the pigeonpea farmers. From each village 20 farmers were drawn through simple random sampling. Thus, a total number of 60 respondents were selected for the study. The study indicates that 61.67 per cent farmers have medium level of awareness about improved scientific practices. Almost all the farmers were aware aboutthe applicationof the farmyard manure and ranked it first in their order of awareness followed by 55 per cent for inorganic manure application. Time and method of sowing ranked third (36.67%) in awareness followed by the inter cropping between millets with 20 per cent. Further it could be observed that more than half of the respondents (55%) had low level of adoption of recommended scientific practices. Almost all of the respondents (96.67%) adopted the application of organic manure followed by the adoption of inorganic fertilizer (28.33%). Timeandmethod of sowing rankedthird in adoption followed by the required seed rate. It is suggested that the farmers should be properly explained the benefits so that they could reap by adopting the improved scientific practices.