Summary Sheet – Helpful for Retention

For

Important agronomic practices and Beneficial insects

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 Important Points

1. This Summary Sheet is similar to the Complete Concept Notes (

definitions/meanings/understanding of the terms) as the relevant
content has been already prepared precisely.

2. It would be useful to go through this Summary sheet just before the

exam or before any Mock Test

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 Table of Contents
1 What is an Agronomic practice? ........................................................................................................... 4

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 “Nothing in Nature blooms all year. Be patient with yourself.” - Unknown

1 What is an Agronomic practice?

✓ Good agricultural practice is a certification system for agriculture, specifying procedures that must
be implemented to create food for consumers or further processing that is safe and wholesome.
✓ As per the crop, there are various agronomic operations/practices that need to be followed for
fruitful crop.
✓ The following are the important agricultural operations that are carried out in various crops.
NOTE: Kindly note, there might be few physiological issues in agricultural crops that have been
added to the list.

Crop Agriculture Meaning

Practice
Bajra Jerking ✓ Bajra jerking is one of the steps followed for the synchronization of
flowering in Bajra.
✓ It is done 20 – 25 days after transplanting or 30- 40 days before direct
sowing.
✓ In this process, the early formed earheads are removed which results in
the uniform flowering of all the heads
Tomato Staking ✓ To keep indeterminate tomato plants from gobbling up too much garden
space and to insure cleaner, healthier tomatoes, many gardeners support
their plants, train them to grow a certain way and regularly pinch off
unwanted growth.
✓ Staking is one popular way of supporting tomatoes.
✓ Put the stake on the prevailing downwind side so the plant will lean against
it when the wind is blowing hard.
✓ Six- to eight-foot-high stakes are good for most tomatoes, although you can
make do with shorter four- to five-foot stakes, if necessary.
✓ Put the stakes in the ground right after you've set out the plants. Drive them
about a foot into the soil, three to five inches away from the plant. Do not
put the stake on the root side of trench-planted tomatoes.
Tobacco Rabbing ✓ Rabbing is the process of burning of trashes, weeds or any organic refuse
on the soil surface.
✓ For rabbing 15-20 cm thick layer of leaves, weeds or paddy straw is
uniformly spread over the soil surface and then it is burnt.
✓ The rabbing burns established weeds, stubble's, weeds-seeds and kills the
insect-pests found on the surface-soil besides improving physical properties
of the soil.
Tobacco Curing ✓ Curing is a process by which the harvested tobacco leaf is made ready for
the market.
✓ It is a well standardized process especially in FCV tobacco to achieve the
desirable qualities in the cured leaf along with the removal of moisture.
✓ The process of curing has an intimate bearing on the quality of cured leaf.
Tea Curing ✓ Curing of tea leaves involves drying of leaves and losing green colour.

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 ✓ It is an oxidation dry fermentation reaction in which water is driven off,
the green colour is lost and the leaves assume a tougher texture and
undergo chemical changes.
Banana Desuckering ✓ Removal of surplus and unwanted suckers from banana plant is known as
desuckering.
✓ Suckers are removed from the mother either by cutting the sucker at ground
level or by destroying the heart of the suckers without detaching the sucker
from the plant.
Tobacco Topping ✓ Removal of flower heads either alone or with few upper top leaves from
the plant to improve the size and quality of the leaves is called as Topping.
✓ When a tobacco plant is topped, especially when it's done very early when
the flower is but a bud, the tobacco plant concentrates its efforts on the
leaves, which are later rolled into cigars. More energy to the leaves means
more power, and stronger tobacco.
Tobacco Desuckering ✓ After topping, Auxillary buds grow. Removal of such lateral branches/
suckers/ auxillary buds is called as Desuckering. Suckers are to be removed
with proper care and chemical suckericide like decanol should be applied. In
the case of the flue-cured virginia tobacco only the flowerhead is removed,
leaving all the 20-24 leaves intact while in case of chewing tobacco only 7-8
leaves are retained on the plant.
Tobacco Priming ✓ "Cropping", "Pulling", and "Priming" are terms for removing mature leaves
from tobacco plants. Leaves are cropped as they ripen, from the bottom to
the top of the stalk.
✓ The higher the position of the leaf in the stalk, the more sun and nutrients it
would have received. This leads to the higher primings having the strongest,
richest tasting tobacco.
✓ The first crop of leaves located near the base of the tobacco stalk are called
"sand lugs" in more rural southern tobacco states. They are called "sand
lugs" because these leaves are close to the ground and get splashed with
sand and clay when heavy rains hit the soil.
Tea Skiffing ✓ You may term the lighter forms of cuts, which the planter gives to the tea
plants in between two consecutive prune years, as skiffing. Introduction of
skiffing has eliminated the necessity of light pruning every year.
✓ It is a lightest pruning. Here foliage is leveled off, only green stems are
removed. Here top 5 – 8 cm new growth is removed so as to obtain uniform
level of plucking surface. If the bushes are pruned about 75cm, it is referred
to as skiffing. In plains of north-east India, tea is pruned every year when
bushes enter the dormant phase.
Tea Tipping ✓ When the shoots (primaries) grow in a tea bush after pruning or skiffing,
they are tipped or decapitated at a predetermined height parallel to the
ground surface. This operation is called “Tipping”. Essentially the initial
few rounds of plucking are called tipping.
Sugar beet Stacking ✓ Beet stacking is the next step of direct delivery with the cleaning/loading
machine. Stacking takes place during the permanent piling stage of harvest
by growers placing sugarbeets in field piles briefly until the loader/cleaner
system delivers it to a receiving station stacker piler.

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 ✓ The stacker piler is a simplified sugarbeet piler that conveys beets to a boom
for placement into a traditional long-term pile.
Sugarcane Trashing ✓ Sugarcane trash is the field residue remaining after harvesting the sugarcane
stalk while bagasse is the fibrous residue left over after milling of sugarcane
canes.
Sugarcane Marcotting ✓ Marcotting is a technique developed by the Sugarcane breeding Institute
which helps in controlled crossing in protected areas.
✓ In this technique rooting in canes that would flower later, is induced at the
nodal region by covering two to three nodes with mixture of sand, silt and
organic matter in a suitable container.
✓ The canes are then detached below marcotted portion and kept in pots and
made use of in crossing.
✓ Although the technique was developed at the Institute, it is not very much
used since field crosses give better seed set under Coimbatore conditions.
However in countries where it is difficult to make field crosses for various
reasons, the technique is being used extensively.
Sugarcane Ratooning ✓ cane propagation can be done by ratooning, in which, when the cane is
harvested, a portion of stalk is left underground to give rise to a succeeding
growth of cane, the ratoon or stubble crop.
Sugarcane Arrowing ✓ Sugarcane belongs to the family Poaceae (Gramineae) and its inflorescence
is a panicle called as arrow. In general each flowering stalk terminates into
single arrow.
✓ In simpler terms, arrowing is flowering in Sugarcane, which in fact is not
desirable from the growers and millers point of view.
Sugarcane Wrapping ✓ Tying, wrapping and propping are done in sugarcane just to provide
mechanical support to the growth up cane plants to prevent lodging.
✓ Wrapping of lower most leaves round the cane which hinder the distribution
of CO2
✓ By wrapping the distribution of CO2 become easy and proper to all the
plants throughout the field.
Rose Stenting ✓ STENTING is a method for the quick propagation of roses. Cutting
(soft/tender wood) and grafting (Whip/tongue) is performed in one action.
✓ In Dutch the word "stenting" means "to stem". It is a combination "stekken"
meaning "to strike a cutting" and "enter" meaning "to graft".
Potato Earthing up ✓ Potatoes will grow very quickly under warm and moist conditions. When
they are 10cm tall, the leafy shoots can be mounded around with soil to
their full height, a process known as 'earthing up'. Earthing up potatoes will
increase the length of underground stems that will bear potatoes.
Sugarcane Earthing up ✓ Earthing-up operation is also known as "hilling-up".
✓ This operation is carried out in two or three stages. The first earthing-up
operation is known “partial earthing-up” and the second/third operation is
known as "full earthing-up".
✓ The partial earthing-up is done at 45 days after planting. In partial earthing-
up, little amount of soil from either side of the furrow is taken and placed
around the base of the shoots.

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 ✓ Full earthing-up is done after 120 days after planting coinciding with the
peak tiller population stage. During full earthing-up the soil from the ridge in
between is fully removed and placed near the cane on either side.
✓ This operation converts the furrows into ridges and ridges into furrows.
Potato Dehaulming ✓ Dehaulming, in potato production refers to the act of detaching the
vegetative part of the potato plant, found above the ground, from the root
tubers.
✓ Dehaulming is one of the pre-harvest practices which are aimed at
hardening the skin of the tubers and therefore reduce injuries during post-
harvest handling.
Potato Suberization ✓ Wounding of potato (Solanum tuberosum L.) tubers results in suberization,
apparently triggered by the release of some chemical factor(s) (Suberin) at
the cut surface.
✓ conversion of the cell walls into corky tissue by infiltration with suberin.
Paddy Parboiling ✓ Parboiling involves partial boiling of the paddy before milling in order to
increase its nutritial value, to change the texture of cooked rice, and reduce
the breakage in milling.
✓ Parboiling is done in three steps: Soaking, steaming and drying.
Paddy Bushening ✓ In general, under broadcast Biasi method, rice seeds are broadcast in a
ploughed field immediately after the onset of monsoon. After about 30 to 45
days when sufficient water is impounded in the field, the fields are ploughed
in the standing crop. This is called Biasi or bushening.
✓ Generally followed in Odisha, Bihar, Chattisgarh and few NE states
Paddy Dapog/Mat ✓ In Mat nursery seedlings are established in a layer of soil mix, arranged on a
nursery firm surface (Concrete floor/ polythene sheet/ seedling trays). Seedlings are
ready for planting within 14-20 days after seeding (DAS). In few cases, even
9-15 DAS.
✓ Required nursery area is 100 m2 / ha (or) 2.5 cent / ha – 1cent / acre
Peas Picking ✓ Its similar to harvesting.
✓ A combination of planting time, growing conditions and type of pea leads to
picking peas at the best time.
✓ While picking peas for the pea seeds, pods should be plump and have a
swollen appearance.
Maize Silking ✓ About 2 to 3 days after the tasseling stage, the silking stage begins. Thready
strands called silks start to emerge and become visible. This is one of the
most critical stages in the development of the corn crop.
✓ silks emerge from the ear to receive pollen and begin the fertilization
process.
Maize Tasseling ✓ Simply put, the tassel is the top most part of a corn plant. The corn tassel is
the part of the plant where the pollen comes from. The pollen pollinates
the ear of corn, which causes the ear of corn to grow.
✓ This stage takes place when the plant reaches its full height and begins to
shed its pollen. At this point the tassels of the plant are completely visible.
Tassels emerge fully about 2 to 3 days prior to the silking stage.
Maize Detasseling ✓ Detasseling corn is removing the immature pollen-producing bodies, the
tassel, from the tops of corn plants and placing them on the ground.

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 ✓ It is a form of pollination control, employed to cross-breed, or hybridize, two
varieties of corn. Fields of corn that will be detasseled are planted with two
varieties of corn.
Lucerne Lopping ✓ Lopping is the indiscriminate cutting of tree branches to stubs or lateral
branches that are not large enough to assume the terminal (main growth
point) role.
✓ The process of lopping can remove up between 50% to 100% of the foliage
(leaf) bearing crown of a tree.
Jute Retting ✓ Retting is a process in which the tied bundles of jute stalks are taken to the
tank by which fibres get loosened and separated from the woody stalk.
✓ The bundles are steeped in water at least 60 cm to 100 cm depth. The
retting process is completed in 8 to 30 days, when the barks separate out
easily from the stick or wood and the fibres are ready for extraction.
✓ There are two types of retting: stem and ribbon. In ribbon retting, ribbons
are stripped out mechanically from the stem of mature jute plants, coiled
and allowed to ret under water. Ribbon retting reduces time of normal
retting by 4–5 days.
✓ After the retting process, stripping begins; women and children usually do
this job
Jute Stripping ✓ Jute stripping (fibre extraction) is the process of removing the fibers from
the stalk after the completion of retting. Fibers are removed from the stalk
by any one of the following methods - Single plants are taken and their
fibers are taken off; Taken off a handful of stalks, breaking it in a to and
fro motion in water; Washing the stalks first by standing in waist-deep water
and then stripping afterward.
Groundnut Pegging ✓ “Pegging” is a Unique Feature in groundnut.
✓ This budding ovary is called a “peg.” The peg enlarges and grows down and
away from the plant forming a small stem which extends to the soil. The
peanut embryo is in the tip of the peg, which penetrates the soil.
Gram Nipping ✓ It is a special cultivation practice of plucking the apical buds of the crop at
about 30-40 days after sowing. Nipping stops the apical growth and
promotes the lateral branching, thus the plants become more vigorous and
produce more flowers and pods and yield per plant is increased.
Cotton Topping ✓ Cotton topping is an agricultural technique in which the shoot tips of
cotton plants are cut off by farmers. The cotton topping should be done as
early as possible from 100 to 120 days from the planting. Cutting the shoots
of cotton plants (topping) at about 10–20 cm from the top of plants is a
cultural practice, which may offer advantages to improve yield and yield
components in cotton production.
Coffee Scuffling ✓ In established coffee fields, scuffling is done towards the beginning of the
dry period. Scuffling during post-monsoon (Oct.-Nov.) from 2nd to 4th year
of planting helps in for conservation of soil moisture. Avoid scuffling in slopy
terrain.
✓ It is also called soil stirring.
✓ It controls weeds and also conserves soil moisture.
Cotton Ginning ✓ Ginning is the process of removing the seeds and debris from cotton. The
term comes from the cotton gin, invented by Eli Whitney in 1794. In modern

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 ginning, the cotton is first dried to remove moisture, then cleaned to remove
any burs, stems, leaves, or other foreign matter.
✓ Determine the moisture content of each lot of seed cotton to be ginned by
using moisture meter. Gin only that cotton with moisture content of 6 to
8.5% at the feeder apron.
Cauliflower Blanching ✓ Blanching is the simple practice of binding large outer leaves together over
and around developing cauliflower heads, to prevent them from yellowing
or browning and developing a bitter flavor due to an overabundance of sun
exposure. Some older white varieties can even turn shades of blotchy
purple.
Banana Propping ✓ At the time of bunch emergence, pseudostem requires support from props.
✓ Tall varieties which produce heavy bunches need propping.
✓ Bamboo or casuarinas poles which have effective life of 3-4 years are
commonly used for propping.
✓ Coir or polythene wire can also be used for propping
Sugarcane Propping ✓ The operation of tying the leaves together using the bottom dry and green
leaves is known as propping.
✓ It is done to check lodging of cane. Usually the trash without removing from
the cane is twisted to form a sort of rope and cane stalks are tied together.
Carrot Forking ✓ Carrots fork because the growing tip of the root has been impeded or
damaged by someone or something.
✓ The someone may be a soil insect or nematode that has nibbled on the tip of
the root. The somethings are likely obstacles in the soil like small pebbles or
stones
Opium Lancing ✓ The scoring of the pods (also called "lancing," "incising," or "tapping") begins
about two weeks after the flower petals fall from the pods.
✓ A set of three or four small blades of iron, glass, or glass splinters bound
tightly together on a wooden handle is used to score two or three sides of
the pod in a vertical direction.
✓ A depth of about one millimeter is desired for the incision. Using a blade-
tool designed to cut to that depth, scoring ideally starts in late afternoon so
the white latex-like raw opium can ooze out and slowly coagulate on the
surface of the pod overnight
Grapes Girdling/ ✓ For grapes girdling or cincturing is used to make the grapes large and
Cincturing sweeter on the grape canopy and are sold as girdled grapes.
✓ Flowering and fruit setting is a problem on some trees; girdling may improve
yield in the same way.
Oil Palm Stripping ✓ Stripping or threshing involves separating the sterilized fruits from the bunch
stalks.
✓ Sterilized FFBs (fresh fruit bunches) are fed into a drum stripper and the
drum is rotated, causing the fruits to be detached from the bunch. The
bunch stalks are removed as they do not contain any oil.
Tobacco Flopping ✓ Soils that stay wet for an extended period are detrimental to tobacco and
standing water can cause tobacco to “flop or drown. Leaves on “flopped”
tobacco droop toward the ground.
✓ Heavy rainfall can stress a tobacco crop at any stage of growth, creating a
poor root system if it occurs early in the season.

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 Banana/ Logging ✓ It is a method followed in plant analysis for assessing requirements for
Sugarcane nutrients for crop production. Commonly followed in Banana and Sugarcane.
Rose and Pulsing ✓ Pulsing is ‘supplying a solution through transpiration stream’. Term pulsing
other cut means placing freshly harvested flowers for a relatively short time from
flowers few seconds to hours in a solution specially formulated to extend their
vase life.
✓ This process is also called as hydration and it can be facilitated by addition of
wetting agent to water like sucrose etc.,.
✓ Cut flowers are pulsed with sugars, such as sucrose. Sucrose pulsing involves
concentration of 5 -20% treated for overnight at 20C or at warm
temperature of 210C for 10 minutes.
✓ Cut flowers are also pulsed with dyes, such as the food grades blue used on
white carnation to give interesting visual effects like blue coloured petal
veins and margins.
Rose and Drying ✓ Cut flowers and foliages reserved for desiccation/drying can be pulsed for
other cut one to a few days with humectants, such as 20-30% glycerol. This process is
flowers known as “uptake preservation”.
✓ This retains suppleness (flexible), associated with the humectants chemical
attracting water vapour from the atmosphere into the tissue.
✓ During pulsing with humectants, often brown, red, green, blue and others
dyes are frequently supplied along with the humectants.
Humectants are ingredients found in lotions and cleansers that hydrate anything by attracting water
molecules like a magnet. Chemically speaking, humectants are hygroscopic substances that form hydrogen
bonds with water molecules.

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