Abstract            Volume:10  Issue-11  Year-2022         Original Research Articles

Online ISSN : 2347 - 3215 Issues : 12 per year Publisher : Excellent Publishers Email : editorijcret@gmail.com

Potato (Solanum tuberosum L.) is the world’s most important root and tuber crop worldwide. Similarly potato is an important food and cash crop in southern Ethiopia including Adola rede District. Its ability to produce high volume food per unit area and time and its ease of cultivation and nutritive content have made it a valuable food security and cash crop for millions of producers. The field trial was conducted to determine the effect of different application rates of NPSB fertilizers on growth, yield and yield components of potato and to identify their economically appropriate rates that maximize yield of the crop. Irish Potato variety Zemen was used for the study. The design used was one way Anova arranged in a Randomized Block, replicated three times. The treatments used consisted of the combinations of four levels of four levels of P (0, 54, 72, and 90 kg/ha) or NPSB (0, 150, 200, 250). Analysis of variance revealed that application of different blended NPSB rates had a significant effect on all traits except that a non-significant effect on days to 50% flowering and maturity. The maximum (80.28 cm) plant height of the plant of potato tended to increase by increasing dose of 250 kg ha^-1 fertilizers NPSB. And the minimum (71.01 cm) height of the plant was measured by control treatment. The maximum (12.49) total tuber number per hill was obtained from plots that receive 250 kg NPSB ha^-1 fertilizer rates. And also the largest average tuber fresh weight per plant (85.47 g) was recorded on 250 kg NPSB ha^-1 fertilizer rate, while the smallest amount of average fresh tuber weight per hill (72.71 g) was recorded on unfertilized potato plot. The highest marketable and total tuber yields of 20.74 and 23.59 t ha^-1, respectively were obtained with the application of 250 kg ha^-1 NPSB fertilizer. Moreover, the maximum net benefit of Birr 350330 ha^-1 with an acceptable marginal rate of returns (MRR) of 14500.82 % was obtained from treatment that received the application of 150 kg ha^-1 blended NPSB fertilizer rates could be recommended for production of potato in the study area.

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