Horticulture: Fruits, Vegetables and Floriculture
Horticulture covers fruits, vegetables, flowers, spices and plantation crops. The exam asks about the important crops of UP and India, propagation methods, orchard layout and post-harvest handling.
Crops of the region
- Fruits: mango (Malihabad and Kakori in Lucknow - Dashehari, Chausa, Langra), guava (Allahabad Surkha, Prayagraj), aonla (Pratapgarh), banana, ber and papaya.
- Vegetables: potato (UP is India's largest producer), tomato, brinjal, okra, pea, onion, chilli and cucurbits.
- Floriculture: marigold, rose, gladiolus, chrysanthemum and tuberose - loose flowers for garlands, cut flowers for bouquets.
Propagation and layout
- Sexual: seed (papaya, guava, vegetables). Asexual: cutting (rose), layering or gootee (guava, litchi), grafting and budding (mango, citrus, ber), sucker (banana), offset (pineapple).
- Planting systems: square, rectangular, quincunx (adds a filler tree at the centre), hexagonal, and contour planting on slopes.
Worked example
A 1 ha orchard is planted in the square system at 5 m × 5 m. Area per plant = 25 m², so plants = 10,000 ÷ 25 = 400. In the quincunx system, fillers go at the centre of each square: 400 main plants plus 400 fillers, so plan irrigation and fertilizer for double the plants during the early years.
Traps that cost marks
- Saying mango is raised from seed; it is vegetatively propagated to keep the variety true.
- Mixing layering (rooted while attached to the parent) with cutting (detached first).
- Forgetting that orchard crops are perennial and vegetables mostly annual.
- Writing 400 plants when spacing is given in metres - convert to square metres first.