STUDIES ON WATER BALANCE IN MANGO (MANGIFERA INDICA L.) ORCHARD

An experiment was conducted to study the influence of soil moisture on vegetative growth, flowering and fruiting in different mango hybrids and cultivars at Gandhi Krishi Vignana Kendra, University of Agricultural Sciences, Bangaluru during the year 2008-2009. Mango cultivars viz.,’Mallika’, ‘Arka Anmol’, ‘Alphonso’ and ‘Baneshan’ were selected. The study indicated that the highest water storage capacity was found in the cultivar ‘Alphonso’ (149.81 mm) followed by ‘Arka Anmol’ (140 mm), ‘Mallika’ (139.81 mm) and lowest was in ‘Baneshan’ (138.03 mm). The actual water utilized by the tree was recorded by a water balance technique and it was found highest in the cultivar ‘Alphonso’ (407.62 mm) followed by ‘Mallika’ (401.28 mm) and ‘Arka Anmol’ (389.98 mm), highest total runoff 317.85 mm was recorded in case of ‘Mallika’ and least 286.98 mm was observed in ‘Baneshan’ orchard.
Soil water storage had a significant influence on growth, flowering and fruiting compared to actual water utilized by the trees among the cultivars, soil moisture level and atmosphere temperature had a significant influence on number of flowers per panicle. The hybrid ‘Mallika’ (283.45) was found to have more bisexual flowers and this was least in case of ‘Baneshan’ (78.00). The percentage of fruit set was higher in ‘Arka Anmol’ (9.20%) and lowest in ‘Baneshan’ (7.30%), whereas the fruit retention per panicle was more in case of ‘Mallika’ (2.2%). The fruits per tree were more in ‘Mallika’ (150) and ‘Alphonso’ (145) and lowest in ‘Baneshan’ (80).