MSc

The present investigation entitled “Standardization of propagation and performance
assessment of mechanical harvesters in clove (Syzigium aromaticum (L) Merr. &
Perry).” was carried out in the Department of Plantation Crops and Spices, College of
Agriculture, Vellayani during the period 2020-2022 with the objective of
standardization of seed treatment for improved seed germination, grafting method and
performance assessment of mechanical harvesters in clove.
Clove is commercially propagated by seeds but the viability of the clove seed is less
and germination is generally poor. Hence, to improve the seed germination rate an
experiment was conducted using seven seed pretreatments and were compared with the
control. Freshly harvested fully matured clove fruits are collected and subjected to
different pretreatments viz. IAA 20 ppm (T1), GA3 50 ppm (T2), GA3 100ppm (T3),
PGPR Mix Ⅰ 5 per cent formulation (T4), PGPR Mix II 5 per cent formulation (T5),
Piriformospora indica 105
cfu/ml (T6), carbendazim 0.1% (T7) and control (T8). These
pretreated seeds were sown in protrays and kept under two growth condition viz.
polyhouse with temperature and humidity control (C1) and polyhouse without
temperature and humidity control (C2). T1 C1 recorded the highest germination and
survival percentage of 90% at 3MAS, basal shoot girth of 0.42cm, mean germination
time of 33.15 days, mean germination rate of 3.02 x10-2day-1
, coefficient of velocity of
germination of 3.21x10-2
, germination rate index of 26.82 %/day, germination index of
1477.30, root shoot ratio of 0.50 and allometric index of 0.99. At the same time T2C1
recorded the highest number of leaves of 7, leaf length of 6.90cm, leaf breadth of
2.76cm, leaf area of 12.37cm2
, shoot length of 15.51cm, fresh shoot weight of 2.28g,
dry shoot weight of 0.48g, root length of 13.85cm, fresh root weight of 0.43g, dry shoot
weight of 0.17g, seedling vigour index Ⅰ of 2598.26 and seedling vigour index Ⅱ of
55.02. Even though seed treatment of IAA 20ppm along with growth condition in
Polyhouse with temperature and humidity control was identified as ideal for better seed
germination, seed treatment of GA3 50ppm along with growth condition in polyhouse
with temperature and humidity control showed superior seedling growth characters.
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Clove is commercially propagated by seed and development of any vegetative
method of propagation can be helpful in reducing the height of the crop, early yield and
true to type. The percentage of success to propagate clove by vegetative method was
less. The production of phenol content may be one reason for this. Hence methods to
overcome the phenol content was tried along with different grafting methods. The
treatments included approach grafting without antioxidant treatment (T1), approach
grafting with antioxidant treatment (T2), soft wood grating without antioxidant
treatment (T3), soft wood grafting with antioxidant treatment (T4), epicotyl grafting
without antioxidant treatment (T5), epicotyl grafting with antioxidant treatment (T6),
patch budding without antioxidant treatment (T7), patch budding with antioxidant
treatment (T8) kept under two growth conditions viz. polyhouse with temperature and
humidity control (C1), polyhouse without temperature and humidity control (C2). At the
end of 6 months, T2C1 recorded higher number of leaves (13.30), length of leaves (4.51)
and breadth of leaves (2.46). Hence approach grafting with antioxidant treatment with
growth condition of Polyhouse with temperature and humidity control is found to be
best for the vegetative propagation of clove
Performance assessment of mechanical harvesters and manual harvesting in clove
were analysed. Mechanical harvesters such as VIMAL 2 stage tree pole pruner (T1),
Wolf-Garten Bypass steel Telescopic pruner (T2), SHAFIRE Steel Blade Hand Pruner
(T3) and Manual harvesting(T4) were compared. Manual harvesting was found to be
more economically feasible, taking only less time for postharvest cleaning operation
with significantly lower operator fatigue and high field coverage.