Influence of Drip Irrigation and Fertigation on Fruit Yield and Water Productivity of Cucumber under Naturally Ventilated Poly House

The experiment on cucumber was conducted in naturally ventilated polyhouse at Horticulture garden, College of Agriculture, Rajendranagar, Hyderabad, Telangana during rabi 2020-2021. The experiment was laid out in a split plot design with 12 treatments consist of three irrigation regimes viz.,drip irrigation scheduled at 0.8 Epan (I1), 1.0 Epan (I2) and 1.2 Epan (I3) as main plots and four NK fertigation levels of 75% recommended dose of NK (F1- N112.5 K75), 100% recommended dose of NK (F2- N150 K100), 125% recommended dose of NK (F3- N187.5 K125) and 150% recommended dose of NK (F4- N225 K150) as sub plot and replicated thrice. yield attributes were significantly higher in irrigation scheduled at 1.2 Epan than 1.0 and 0.8 Epan. Fruit yield was significantly higher in drip irrigation scheduled at 1.2 Epan (83.90 t ha-1) than 1.0 Epan (68.80 t ha-1) and 0.8 Epan (59.50 t ha-1). Yield attributes were significantly higher at 150% recommended dose of NK than 75% recommended dose of NK. Fruit yield was significantly higher at 150 % recommended dose of NK (76.70 t ha-1) than 75% recommended dose of NK (60.30 t ha-1) and onpar with both 125% and 100% recommended dose of NK. Water use efficiency was higher in drip irrigation scheduled at 0.8 Epan (28.6 kg m-3) followed by 1.2 Epan (27.2 kg m-3) and 1.0 Epan (26.6 kg m-3). 150 % recommended dose of NK registered significantly higher water use efficiency (30.1 kg m-3) than 75% recommended dose of NK (23.5 kg m-3). It was recommended that application of 1.2 Epan irrigation and 150 kg N, 100 kg K2O ha-1 by fertigation for maximization of yield.