Garden Management -  Arecanut

Soil and climate requirements of coconut, arecanut, and cocoa are described in this page

Nutrient Requirement

Annual application of 100 g N (220 g urea), 40 g P₂O₅ (200 g rock phosphate) and 140 g K₂O (235 g muriate of potash) in addition to 12 kg each of green leaf and compost per palm per year is recommended.  The fertilizers are to be applied in two split doses.  One third of the fertilizer is applied in May - June and two third along with the organics during September-October.  Fertilizers are applied in basins around the palm dug to a depth of 15-20 cm and 0.5-1.0 m radius leaving 20 cm from the base of the palm.  After application, the soil is rolled up and covered with organic matter and soil.

On an average, 5.5 to 6.0 tonnes of wastes are available from one ha of areca garden per year.  This can be effectively used as organic source of nutrients for areca palms.  But direct application of these wastes in the garden will take long time for decomposition and will not meet the nutrient demand of the crop immediately.  Hence, these materials can be composted using earthworms effectively and used as organic manure in areca gardens.  To prepare vermicompost, areca wastes are chopped into small pieces of 10 cm and heaped.  The heap should be mixed with cow dung slurry @ 10 kg / 100 kg of waste and kept for two weeks with sprinkling water daily.  Then the chopped material is arranged in beds of one-meter width and convenient length. Cement tanks or trenches can be used for this purpose.  A layer of 10-15 cm waste material is alternated with 2 cm layer of cow dung over which earthworms are released at the rate of 1000 numbers per square meter.  The wastes are converted into fine granular, odourless vermicompost within 60 days.  During this period, the earthworm population is doubled.  About 8 kg /palm/year of vermicompost meets the crop nutrient demand in terms of nitrogen.  The two species of earthworms Eudrilus eugeniae and Eisenia foetida can be used.

  Cultural operations

The cultural operations vary from area to area.  In Maland tracts the main purpose of cultivation is to loosen the soil and to rebuild the soil fertility after the heavy rains during monsoon.  In Maidan tracts the purpose of cultivation is to conserve the soil moisture and prevent the hardening of the soil, as the soils are heavy in these areas.  In general the cultivation was found to increase the yield by 10-20%.  In light soils digging can be done once in two years.  But in heavy soils digging has to be done every year.  Clean cultivation was found to give better yield.  When planting is done on hill slopes, contour planting gave highest yields.  Mulching is another operation being followed in the arecanut gardens.  This checks evaporation during summer, erosion during rainy seasons and keeps the weeds under check.  Chopped areca leaves, grass, arecanut husk and dry leaves collected from the forests can be used as mulch in areca gardens.

  Irrigation

Arecanut cannot withstand drought for a long time.  Being a perennial crop, once affected by water stress, it may require two-three years to regain the normal vigour and yield.  The death of palms due to moisture stress is also not uncommon.

In West Coast of India, where more than 50 per cent of arecanut is cultivated, rainfall is mostly confined to June-November months. Monsoon is followed by a prolonged dry spell normally extending from November to May.  Excess evaporation, faster rate of wind speed, greater vapour pressure gradient in the above ground atmosphere and rise in temperature are the regular features of summer in these regions and as a result, the crop is invariably subjected to drought conditions.  If the monsoon is delayed, the drought situation further aggravates.  Therefore optimizing the irrigation requirements and also economizing the irrigation water assumes major importance in arecanut cultivation.  At Vittal conditions, irrigation intervals of 5 and 10 days were found superior throughout the season.  When irrigation treatments were based on Irrigation Water/Cumulative Pan Evaporation (IW/CPE) ratio, the results showed that irrigation of 30 mm of water when the CPE is 30 mm is optimum.  This works out an irrigation frequency of once in 7-8 days during November-December, once in 6 days during January-February and once in 4-5 days during March-May.  The quantity of water to be applied is about 200 lit per palm/irrigation for Vittal conditions.

During the summer, majority of the farmers face scarcity of water and it will be difficult to supply the required water to the palms.  To overcome this problem, new irrigation methods were tried which can save water without affecting the yield of arecanut.  They are sprinklers and drip irrigation methods.  Sprinkler and drip irrigations can save 20 and 44 per cent respectively of water under Vittal conditions for an Eo of 66%  compared to conventional method of irrigation (flooding and splashing).  About 20 litres of water per day per palm is to be given through drip irrigation. Three to Five drippers/ micro tubes should be placed in the basin at 50 - 60 cm away from the trunk.

  Ferti

Application of nutrients through irrigation water is called as fertigation.  This procedure can be profitably followed in arecanut.  The studies at CPCRI have shown that in the initial stages of areca garden only 75% of the recommended dose of fertilizer is sufficient when the fertilizer was given through drip irrigation.  The fertilizer should be split into ten parts and should be applied once in 20 days from November to May.