Response of planting dates and genotypes on vegetative and floral characters in gladiolus

An experiment was conducted to study the effect of six dates of planting along with four genotypes on vegetative and floral characters of gladiolus. Planting of corms on 31 March resulted into the maximum plant height (119.12cm), spike length (98.06 cm), floret number/spike (13.20) and floret diameter (9.77 cm). Whereas, the minimum number of days for sprouting (10.88), days to slipping (74.27) and days to basal floret opening (86.15) were recorded for corms planted on 15 May. Among the four genotypes evaluated, Red Majesty was significantly superior to other genotypes in respect of plant height (117.71 cm) and spike length (92.47 cm). However, minimum number of days to spouting (20.88), slipping (76.85) and basal floret opening (89.42) and duration of spikes in field (8.65 day) were recorded for variety Suchitra, whereas the number of florets/spike (12.29) and floret diameter (9.93 cm) was significantly higher in Big Time Supreme, The interaction between different genotypes and planting dates for most of the traits was observed significant.