Effect of organic manures, bioinoculants and inorganic fertilizers on yield, nutrient uptake and nutrient recovery by broccoli

An experiment was carried out on nutrient management in broccoli at Regional Research and Technology Transfer Station, Keonjhar, Odisha for two years. The test crop received four manure treatments: namely (i) no manure, (ii) FYM @10 t/ha, (iii) vermicompost (VC) @ 5 t/ha, (iv) FYM @ 5 t/ha + VC @ 2.5 t/ha, which are super imposed with six treatments, namely: (i) control (ii) bioinoculants (BI) alone (iii) 75% NPK (iv) 100% NPK, (v) 75% NPK + BI (vi) 100% NPK + BI. The maximum yield of curd (139.49 q/ha) was recorded at 100% NPK + bioinoculants along with FYM @ 5 t/ha and vermicompost (VC) @ 2.5 t/ha. The N uptake varied between 3.5–98.8 kg/ha, phosphate 0.4–12.0 kg/ha and potash 2.0–53.3 kg/ha. The highest amount of nutrients was removed at optimum dose of fertilizers and the lowest in absolute control. The highest recovery of nutrients (58.6% N, 47% P, and 17.6% K) was when the crop applied with VC alone or 50% each of FYM and VC.