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The variety identification assists the imperative goals such as alleviating legal claims and indorsing intellectual property rights and maintenance of genetic purity. The study was undertaken to appraise sugarcane clones for morphological physical characteristics for their use in breeding program, selection, identification and seed production. Experiment consisting of nine clones was sown at experimental area, Sugarcane Research Institute, AARI, Faisalabad during 2017 and 2018. The trial was replicated thrice. Data were documented on morphological features at ten months’ age of crop. There were important differences among the clones for stalk height, cane diameter, leaf blade width and leaf length. The growth habit of S-2008-FD-25 was erect and others were semi erect. Maximum height of 455 cm was seen in S-2009-SA-8. Maximum number of leaves per plant was observed in S-2008-AUS-133. Leaf colour of all clones was green and semi erect attitude. Spines were present on sheath of S-2008-AUS-134 only. The shape of dewlap of all clones were deltoid. Splits were present in S-2005-US-54, S-2011-FD-18 and M-2238-89. Bud grooves on internodes were present on S-2011-SL-62 and PSR-97-41. The internodes were of cylindrical shape. Flowering was absent in all the clones. The morphological descriptors presented for identification of the nine sugarcane clones are twenty-eight, that are distinctive and can be used for proof of identity, variety selection breeding and commercial seed production. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study was conducted during 2005 to 2009 in District Muree, Pakistan. Rapid degradation of watersheds due to soil erosion, deforestation, urbanization is the critical issue in high hill areas. Housing and infrastructure development, being the top priority of government is also impacting the health of watersheds; resultantly our dams are losing their capacity due to increased sedimentation. The study aimed at assessing the current magnitude and distribution of development in two important watersheds of Punjab. The assessment was carried out by correlating infrastructure development with soil erosion and regime of water in the channels. Impervious land use in Simly watershed is increasing at a pace of 1.91 % per year and presently it is 13.23 % of the total area. It has also been determined that at current pace of development, 16.84 % of the area in Simly will be under impervious land use by 2020. Based on the land use of the area, different channels in Simly stream system were categorized into urbanizing, agriculture and forest and main channel. The study revealed that the soil erosion is more in areas under impervious land use or where the land is disturbed due to developmental activities. The sediment load in different categories of channels was studied. It was found that sediment load in the urbanizing water channel was highest (26.03 g/l) followed by agriculture (8.86 g/l), and forest was the least (1.73 g/l) contributor of sediment in the channels. Water quality of the stream system has also been deteriorated. Turbidity and hardness was more in urbanizing as compared to other land use. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Effect of different nitrogen levels and weed-crop competition durations on yield and yield components of maize was evaluated at Post Graduate Agricultural Research Station, University of Agriculture, Faisalabad, Pakistan during 2005 and 2006 kharif seasons. The objective was to determine the critical period of weed-crop competition in maize crop under different fertility levels. In this study, naturally occurring population of weeds was allowed to compete with maize crop for 0 (weed free throughout growing season), 2, 3, 4, 5 and 15 weeks (weedy throughout growing season). Three nitrogen levels (150, 200 and 250 kg/ha) were used. The results revealed that weed free plots fertilized at 250 kg N produced higher grain yield (7.79 t/ha) against the significantly minimum grain yield (2.60 t/ha) from the plots fertilized at 150 kg N and remained weedy throughout crop growth period. Nitrogen levels and weed-crop competition durations significantly affected plant height, grains number per cob, time taken to 50 percent tasseling, time taken to 50 percent silking, number of rows per cob and number of cobs per plant. These parameters finally contributed towards grain yield. It was concluded that under low nitrogen levels, intensive weed control efforts are required to minimize weed-crop competition compared with higher nitrogen applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The farmer's practice of buring the crop residues to clear the land before sowing is seen in various crop zones in Pakistan. In rice-wheat cropping system in Punjab, rice stubble is considered as a big problem for farmers. The crop stubbles damage the implements like cultivator rotavator that is why farmers prefers to burn these stubbles before preparation. The burning of rice stubble ease the field operations for wheat sowing but deteriorate the air and soil quality. To solve this problem of farmers, a research experiment was conducted during 2017-18 and 2018-19 at Agronomic Research Station Farooqabad to evaluate the effect of various sowing techniques on yields parameter and economics of wheat crop under rice wheat cropping system. The experiment was laid down with randomized complete block design (RCBD) with three replications. The treatments included viz.T1: sowing with happy seeder (Zero tillage), T2: sowing of wheat without burning of rice stubble (Conventional Technique), T3: sowing of wheat by field preparation with Rotavator (two times), T4: sowing of wheat after burning stubbles of rice crop. The results of all treatments were significantly differed with each other. Maximum plant height (95 cm and 97 cm), numbers of productive tillers/m² (325 tillers/m² and 328 tillers/m2), thousand grain weight (39 g and 42 g), grain yield (3880 and 3700 kg/ha) and benefit-cost ratio (2.36 and 2.25) were recorded from the treatment where wheat crop was sown with happy seeder (zero tillage) during study years 2017-18 and 2018-19, respectively than other techniques. It was concluded that farmers mayfetch higher yield and economics in wheat by sowing with happy seeder in rice wheat cropping system [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Current study was conducted to check the genetic exploration for quality aspect of brassica at Department of Plant Breeding and Genetics, University of Agriculture, Faisalabad during 2017- 18. The parents and the crosses were evaluated following Randomized Complete Block Design (RCBD) with three replications. Highly significant differences were noted among all the genotypes for seed oil, seedcake protein, glucosinolate, oleic acid and erucic acid contents showing high genetic potential for improvement. Analysis for the general combining ability showed almost significant differences except for protein that showed maximum non-significant difference among the lines. Significant difference were also noted among testers except for protein and erucic acid. Specific combining ability showed both significant and non-significant differences in positive and negative directions. Analysis for the components of genetic variance indicated that non-additive gene action played a significant role for the inheritance of the traits. This was further continued by GCA/SCA ratio values (0.040, 0.023, 0.0174, -0.0026, 0.178) which were less than 1 that depicted non-additive variance involved in these traits so as to achieve homozygous line. On basis of oil, erucic acid, oleic acid and glucosinolate these combinations viz. UAF12 × Torch, Toria × Candle, UAF11 × Torch and Span × Candle, were selected for SCA effects relative heterosis, heterobeltiosis and GCA estimates. These combinations can be used as source of quality traits in further breeding program. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Methyle eugenol and cue-lure were evaluated for monitoring the population of melon fruit fly in bitter gourd fields during 2007 in district Faisalabad and Sahiwal. Cue-lure appeared as more effective and resulted in higher male catches of fruit flies (171.82/trap/week) as compared to methyl eugenol (81.69/trap/week). At ecological conditions of Faisalabad, maximum temperature played maximum role i.e. 33.80 percent while average temperature and wind speed had the impact of 12.70 percent each on the population fluctuation. At ecological conditions of Sahiwal, maximum temperature again showed maximum contribution (40%) towards population fluctuation of melon fruit fly. Rainfall and wind speed positively correlated with the population of trapped melon fruit fly. Farmers can monitor the population of fruit fly with the trap and can control it efficiently and economically. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Present study was conducted at Surgarcane Research Institute, Faisalabad, Pakistan during 2018-19 to evaluate twelve (12) exotic sugarcane clones imported from Philippines for biometric traits and diseases resistance in local climatic conditions. These clones were put in preliminary yield trials (4th stage) of varietal development program to evaluate their performance in comparison with local check varieties HSF 240 and CPF 249. The exotic genotypes along with local checks were subjected to randomized complete block design (RCBD) by keeping three replications during crop season 2018-19. Six biometric traits like germination%, tillers per plant, no. of canes, cane weight, cane yield and sugar contents along with resistance to two major diseases viz. red rot and smut of sugarcane were studied. Two-sided Dunnett’s multiple test was used for comprehensive comparison among bimetric traits. The results of this study indicated that all the clones differed significantly for their agronomic traits. Although some varieties of Philippines showed better performance for cane yield (PSR 01-46, 184.7 t/ha) as compared to check varieties but they could not surpass them for sugar contents (11.54%) and also found susceptible to red rot and smut diseases. Only three exotic clones viz. PSR 01-28, PSR 98-11 and PSR 99-182 were promoted to next selection stage of varietal development program on the basis of higher or comparable cane yield (120.7, 141.7 and 105.3 t/ha, respectively) than check varieties and diseases reaction. However, the sugar contents of these exotic clones were found at par with check varieties and thus further testing and evaluation is required to improve adaptability and stability for consistent performance under local agro-ecological conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]