Effect of Arburscular mycorrhizea(AM), poultry manure(PM), NPK fertilizer and the combination of AM-PM on the growth and yield of okra (Abelmoschus esculentus)

Five accessions of Abelmoschus esculentus, obtained from two research and academic institution in Nigeria were used to access the effect of Arbuscular mycorrhizea (AM), Poultry Manure (PM), Inorganic fertilizer (NPK), and the synergy of Arbuscular mycorrhizea (AM) and Poultry Manure (PM) on the growth and yield of okra. This experiment was a 5 x 5 factorial, laid out in a Randomized Complete block design with 5- replications. The experiment was a pot experiment carried out at the Babcock University horticultural garden (rain forest ecology). This experiment was carried out during the late planting season of November 2011 to January 2012. Data were collected on nine yield related characters. The combined Analysis of Variance showed significance treatment, accession, replication and accession x treatment interaction effects on majority of the trait evaluated at 0.01 and 0.05 probabilities. Combination of AM-PM treatment produced a significantly high results in the traits observed though not significantly different from NPK treatment result in all traits, implying that AM-PM treatment can conveniently replace NPK in the growth and yield of okra. There was a significant positive correlation between plant height, leaf area, fruit width at maturity, pod weight and seed weight in okra. Bab okr3 and NH.Cb/07/008 performed well in pod weight per plant and fruit length at maturity and would make good putative parent for selection in an okra hybridization program. (Nwangburuka CC, Olawoyi OJ, Oyekale K., Ogunwenmo O., Denton O., Daramola DS. Awotade D. Effect of Arburscular mycorrhizea (AM), poultry manure (PM), NPK fertilizer and the combination of AM-PM on the growth and yield of okra (Abelmoschus esculentus). Nat Sci 2012;10(9):35-41). (ISSN: 1545-0740). http://www.sciencepub.net/nature . 5