Crop Diversification in Tungabhadra Project Area of Karnataka

Abstract – A field experiment was undertaken on "Cropping System Diversification Studies" at Agricultural Research Station, Siruguppa under University of Agricultural Sciences, Dharwad (Karnataka). The soil type was deep black with pH 8.2. The available NPK contents in soil were 205, 32 and 485 kg/ha, respectively. Yield data pooled during rabi/summer indicated that significantly higher yield (28000 kg/ha) was recorded in ridge gourd followed by tomato (26598 kg/ha) and radish (11064 kg/ha). Highest rice equivalent yield (26518 kg/ha) was recorded in riceridgegourd cropping system, which was followed by ricetomato (1671 kg/ha), rice-clusterbean (11810 kg/ha) and riceradish (10313 kg/ha), when compared to existing rice-rice (6953 kg/ha) system. Gross return, net return and B:C ratio were also higher in rice-ridgegourd cropping system (Rs. 201217, Rs. 166485 and 5.79, respectively), when compared to the other systems and rice-rice cropping system alone.