THE EFFECT AND COST BENEFIT RATIO OF DIFFERENT WEEDING METHODS ON THE YIELD OF CHICKPEA UNDER AGROCLIMATIC CONDITIONS OF DISTRICT KARAK

An experiment was conducted at agricultural research station ahmad wala, karak, khyber pakhtunkhawa-pakistan, during rabi season 2006-07 for elaborating the effect of weeding method son the yield and yield components of chickpea. the experimental design was randomized complete block (rcb) with split plot arrangement. the experiment was replicated four times with the main plots including three varieties of chickpea whereas the subplots comprised of four treatments viz. hand weeding one time,hand weeding twice, isoproturon 500 ew and a weedy check. the weedicide isoproturon was applied @ 0.741 kg a.i. ha^-1 as a postemergence. the data were recorded on number of weeds m-2,number of productive branches plant-1, number of pods plant-1,number of grains pod-1, 1000 grain weight (g), grain yield kg ha-1and cost benefit ratio, number of weeds m-2, number of productive branches plant-1, number of pods plant-1, number of grains pod-1,1000 grains weight (g) and grains yield (kg ha-1) were significantly affected by different treatments. maximum grain yield was producedby normal hand weeding twice treatment (1429.90 kg ha-1) and proved to be the best one, while lowest grain yield (777.95 kg ha-1)was recorded in weedicide application. similarly maximum numberof pods plant-1 (52.50), number of grains pod-1 (2.42), number of productive branches plant-1 (6.42), 1000 grain weight (235.58 g)and highest grain yield (1429.90 kg ha-1) were recorded in normal hand weeding twice treatment. the cost: benefit analysis revealed the highest cost: benefit ratio of 1:1:9 in the hand weeding twice.thus, hand weeding of chickpea twice is recommended for the chickpea growers of karak, khyber pakhtunkhawa-pakistan.