Effect of Zinc and Iron Biofortification on growth Characters of Finger millet (Eleusine coracana L.) with various weed management practices

The results of field experiment entitled “Weed Management in Finger millet (Eleusine coracana L.) with Zinc and Iron Biofortification” was carried out during the kharif seasons for two consecutive years i.e., 2023 and 2024 at the Instructional Farm, Department of Agronomy, Rajasthan College of Agriculture, MPUAT, Udaipur. The experiment comprising twenty treatments combinations involving four treatments of bio fortification viz., B0 : RDF (Control), B1 : RDF + 25 kg ZnSO4 + 20 kg FeSO4 as soil application, B2 : RDF + 0.5 % ZnSO4 + 0.5 % FeSO4 as foliar application and B3 : RDF + 25 kg ZnSO4 + 20 kg FeSO4 as soil application + 0.5 % ZnSO4 and FeSO4 as foliar application and five treatments of weed management viz., W0 : Weedy check, W1 : Hand weeding twice at 20 DAS and 40 DAS, W2 : Atrazine 500 g ha-1 as PE, W3 : Metsulfuron Methyl + Chlorimuron Ethyl 0.004 kg ha-1 as PoE and W4 : Bispyribac-sodium 25 g ha-1 as PoE was laid out in Split plot design with three replications. As a test crop finger millet variety ML 365 was used. The results indicated that different bio fortification treatments in finger millet significantly influenced the weed dry matter of some broad leaved and narrow leaved weeds at different crop growth stages as compared to weedy check during both the seasons and pooled basis. The The lowest dry matter of broad leaved species (viz., Digeria arvensis and Commelina benghalensis) and narrow leaved species (viz., Setaria glauca, Dactyloctenium agyptium and Echinocloa colona) was recorded with the treatment RDF + 25 kg ZnSO4 + 20 kg FeSO4 as soil application + 0.5% ZnSO4 and FeSO4 as foliar application. Among the different bio fortification treatments RDF + 25 kg ZnSO4 + 20 kg FeSO4 as soil application + 0.5% ZnSO4 & FeSO4 as foliar application resulted significantly superior plant growth parameters (viz., plant height and dry matter accumulation at 30, 60, 90 DAS).