Ash Gourd
Season and Field preparation
Soil
A deep loamy soil with the pH range of 5 - 7.5 is suitable. A warm tropical climate is ideal for higher yield.
Season
Planting is done during July and January.
Seed rate
2.5 kg of seeds required are required for a hectare.
Seed treatment
Soak the seeds in double the quantity of water for 30 minutes and incubate for 6 days. The seeds are treated with Trichoderma viride 4 g or Pseudomonas fluroscens 10 g or Carbendazim 2 g/kg of seeds before sowing.
Preparation of field
Plough the field 3 – 4 times. Dig pits of 30 cm x 30 cm x 30 cm at a spacing 2 x 1.5 m and form basins.
Sowing
Five to six seeds are sown in each pit. After germination, the seedlings are thinned to two/ pit.
Irrigation
Irrigate the basin before dibbling the seeds and thereafter once in a week.
Application of fertilizers
Apply Azospirillum and Phosphobacteria @ 2 kg/ha and Pseudomonas @ 2.5 kg/ha along with FYM 50 kg and neem cake @ 100 kg before last ploughing. Apply 10 kg FYM and 100 g of 6:12:12 NPK mixture/pit as basal and 10 g N/ pit at 30 days after sowing.
After cultivation
Hoeing and weeding can be done as and when necessary. Spray Ethrel 250 ppm (2.5 ml/10 lit of water) four times at weekly intervals commencing from 15th day after sowing.
Quality seedling production:
Nursery raising
In hi-tech horticulture, use 12 days old healthy seedlings obtained from shade net houses for planting. Raise the seedlings in protrays having 98 cells. Use well decomposed cocopeat is used as medium. Sow one seed per cell. Water regularly twice a day. Transplant about 12 days old seedlings in the main field
Fertigation
Apply 60:30:30 kg of NPK/ha throughout the cropping period through split application. 75% of phosphorus, is applied through superphosphate as basal dose.
Fruit fly