Performance evaluation of manually operated single row cotton planter

Abstract

A proper placement of seed in field is most important operation in order to obtain optimum yield of crop. In India about 75 % of the land holders are small and marginal land holding capacity. Considering the limitations due to costly seed, traditional method of manual dibbling, labour shortage and small marginal land holding pattern there is need of small manual planter for small and marginal land holders. Cotton, the white gold, is the king of textile, fibers and it is an important worldwide cash crop. The sowing of cotton is labour intensive as its planting requires 3-4 man days/ha. In view of the above, the single row cotton planter was tested in laboratory as well as in field as per IS code: 6316-1993 with specific objectives. The cost of planting cotton by manually method is approximately 600 to 700 Rs/ha, whereas the cost by this machine is 470 Rs/ha. The field evaluation of manually cotton planter was done at speed of 1.72 km/hr with field capacity of 0.170 ha/hr and field efficiency of 82.49 %. The seed uniformity of cotton planter was observed higher as compared to manual sowing. The average labour requirement for sowing cotton in manually operated cotton planter was 6.82 man hr/ha.