Fruit and Plantation Crop Production
Fruit and Plantation Crop Production carries heavy marks: crop selection by agro-climatic zone, planting density, training and pruning, flowering management and harvest timing.
Crop-region fit in Maharashtra
- Mango: Alphonso in Konkan (Ratnagiri, Sindhudurg), Kesar in Marathwada; flowering in November-January, with no irrigation during flowering to check excess vegetative growth.
- Banana: Basrai, Grand Naine, Shrimanti; tissue-culture planting material gives uniformity.
- Grape: Thompson Seedless and Sonaka in Nashik; pruning plus gibberellic acid for berry size and seedlessness.
- Pomegranate: Bhagawa and Ganesh in Solapur, Ahmednagar and Nashik; bahar treatment (ambe, mrig, hasta) by withholding irrigation 45-60 days, then pruning, spreads harvest across the year.
- Citrus: Nagpur mandarin, mosambi; sapota; cashew in Sindhudurg and Raigad; coconut and arecanut in the coastal belt.
Key management rules
Plantation crops are perennial and need long-term soil, shade and drainage planning. Training builds a framework; pruning removes dead, diseased and crowded wood and regulates bearing. Fruit drop is reduced by irrigation scheduling, nutrition and pest control. Use grafted or tissue-culture material, keep the graft union above soil level, stake young plants, and follow a nutrient calendar.
Worked example. Pomegranate at 3 m x 3 m: 3 x 3 = 9 m2; 10,000 / 9 = 1,111 plants/ha. Add 5% gap filling = 1,167 plants. Reasoning: the population formula is the same for every crop; only the spacing changes.
Traps that cost marks
- Planting the graft union below soil level.
- Irrigating mango during flowering.
- Treating bahar as a fertilizer rather than an irrigation-withholding and pruning schedule.
- Quoting a spacing without converting it to metres.