Effect of Organic and Inorganic Fertilizer on Growth, Yield and Nutritional Quality of Cucumber (Cucumis sativus)

Abstract

The application of organic and inorganic fertilizer on agricultural farming as a management practice has tremendously brought about a great boost to crop yield due to improvement in soil fertility. The thrust of this experiment was to compare the effect of organic and inorganic fertilizer on the growth, yield and nutritional qualities of cucumber (cucumis sativus). The research was conducted at the Teaching and Research Farm of Ekiti State University, Ado-Ekiti in 2019 using a randomized complete block design with three replications. The treatment consisted of sole application of NPK fertilizer, sole application of goat manure, sole application of poultry, NPK + goat manure, NPK fertilizer + poultry manure and control. Parameters assessed include vine length (cm), stem girth (cm), number of leaves, fruit weight (g), length of fruit (cm), fruit diameter (cm) and number of fruit plant-1. The results revealed that poultry manure (PM) significantly influenced all the agronomic parameters and yield of cucumber than other treatments. There were significant differences among the agronomic parameters measured including yield in all the treatments except the number of fruits plant-1. Poultry manure had the highest fruit yield followed by goat manure, NPK fertilizer and poultry manure respectively. For the proximate test, it was observed in the results that there were slight differences in the composition of the proximate of cucumber based on the treatments, suggesting that fertilization can influence the proximate of fruit and vegetables. The overall assessment of the research suggested that poultry manure is the best fertilizer for cucumber growth and yield performance.