Saffron corm production as influenced by integrated phosphorus management

Study confirmed significant effect of FYM in increasing corm production. The maximum corm production of 11.444 t ha(-1) was recorded with the highest organic application and the corresponding increase over its control (4.738 t ha(-1)) was 141.53%. The phosphorus application recorded maximum corm production of 9.278 t ha(-1) when applied at 100 kg ha(-1) and the corresponding increase over its respective control (6.513 t ha(-1)) was 42.45%. The application of phosphorus solubilizers (PSB) also increased the corm production significantly and the increase recorded was 15.80%. The effect of FYM, PSB and phosphorus increased the number of corms in all corm weight grades (i.e. >15 g, 8-15 g and <8 g), significantly over their respective controls. The maximum corm number (272,000, 334,000 and 238,000 ha(-1)) in the biggest weight grade (>15 g) were recorded when phosphorus was applied at 100 kg ha(-1), FYM at 60 t ha(-1) and with PSB inoculation in the test crop. The increases over their corresponding controls were 67.90, 169.35 and 25.26%, respectively. Their interactions were also found statistically significant in increasing the corm number.