Effect of Weed Management Practices on Weed Dynamics, Nutrient Depletion, Productivity and Profitability of Summer Mungbean (Vigna radiata) under Zero Tillage Condition

Background: Weeds are prime factor that adversely effects on growth, quality and yield of mungbean during summer and rainy season. Being a short duration crop, it faces heavy weed competition right from the early growth stages to harvesting. The critical period of crop weed competition in mungbean was initial 25-30 days, yield may be reduce up to 50-90% if weeds not manage at this stage. Hence, there is a need to find out the successful weed management strategies to realize higher growth and yield. The progressive transformation of agriculture concerning intensive use of herbicides is gaining status in recent years due to easy, lower cost, timeliness and successful controlling weeds. Therefore, keeping above information in view, the present study was undertaken to assess the effect of different weed management practices in summer mungbean under zero tillage condition to find out the better weed management, higher productivity and profitability. Methods: In this field-laboratory investigation during summer season, 2019, different herbicides were applied to manage weeds in mungbean. Eight treatments were applied based on various application windows. In the field and laboratory, the collected samples were determined for crop weed competition, yield attributes, yields and net returns. Result: The results revealed that weed free treatment was recorded lowest weed population at 30 DAS and harvest (1.8 and 2.9), weed dry weight (1.1 and 1.9g) and highest weed control efficiency (96.3 and 94.9%) followed by Pendimethalin (PE) fb one HW and Shaked (Propaquizafop + Imezathyper) application. The similar results also observed in nutrients removed by weeds. Among yield attributes, weed free treatment recorded the longest pod length, no. of pods/plant, no. of seeds/pod and test weight (7.9, 21.0, 9.7 and 43.0g, respectively) which was at par with Pendimethalin (PE) fb one HW and Shaked (Propaquizafop + Imezathyper) application. The magnitude of seed yield was increased under weed free (10.1 q/ha) and Shaked (Propaquizafop + Imezathyper) (9.5 q/ha) treatments by 127.9 and 113.8%, respectively over weedy check. Application of Shaked (Propaquizafop + Imezathyper) recorded highest net returns (Rs 55,079/ha) and B: C (2.8) over rest of the treatments. It can concluded that application of Shaked (Propaquizafop + Imezathyper) @ 2 L/ha at 20 DAS recommended for better weed control, higher yield and net returns of summer mungbean under zero tillage condition.