Effect of Phosphate Solubilizing Bacteria and Rhizobium on Growth and Yield of Legume Plants (Vigna radiata L. and Vigna mungo L.)

The experiments were conducted in the Department of Pathology & Microbiology, Sardar Vallabhai Patel University of Agriculture and Technology, Meerut, during kharif season 2017-18, 2018-19 and 2019-20. The experiment was laid out in Completely randomized research design with three replicates and seven treatments.To the study the effect of PSB and Rhizobium on the seed germination, plant height, root length, shoot length, number of leaves, number of branches, number of pods, seed weight, grain yield and harvest index of green gram and black gram variety in different treatments. The P-value of seed germination percentage of Vigna radiata L. and Vigna mungo L were found highly significant. The highest plant height (17.50 cm and 27.69cm) was recorded, combined effect of IARI Rhizobium +IARI PSB and mean value combined treatments were observed with compared to control (11.90 to 18.67cm). The highest root length 3.30 cm and 4.40cm were recorded and shoot length was 12.80 and 23.29. The green gram plants inoculated with IARI Rhizobium + IARI PSB, recorded the maximum root and shoot length (4.40cm and 23.29 cm) followed by Native Rhizobium + Native PSB (3.80cm) which were significantly superior over all strains. The plant inoculated with different IARI Rhizobium+ IARI PSB strains produced significantly higher mean (13.60, 12.39 plant -1) number of leaves compared to control. The highest number of branches per plant 13.20 and 14.22 recorded which were treated with IARI PSB + IARI Rhizobium and the highest number of pods per plant 15.10 and 15.67 were recorded in treated with IARI PSB + IARI Rhizobium. Control treatment show a very less seed weight (4.63, 4.79 pot-1), while the plant treated with Native Rhizobium+ Native PSB (6.94, 7.63 pot-1) show a significant increase in seed weight. The highest (7.57, 7.65 pot-1) seed weight was recorded in the plants which were given IARI Rhizobium + IARI PSB treatments. The highest grain yield (4.70 g ha-1/pot-1) was recorded in which treated with the Native Rhizobium+ Native PSB (4.40, 5.63g ha-1/pot-1) increased compared to control (3.10 g ha-1/pot-1) addressed with seed co-inoculation. The highest mean value (3.24, 3.56 pot-1) of harvest index was recorded in plants which were treated with IARI Rhizobium + IARI PSB and Native Rhizobium+ PSB strains (3.18, 3.47pot-1) as compare to control pot.