FOX TAIL MILLET CULTIVATION PRACTICES

1. CULTIVATION
PRACTICES OF
FOXTAIL MILLET

2. overview
1.Introduction
2.Botany of crop
3.Economic Importance
4.Origin & Distribution
5.Soil & Climate
6.Seasons & Varieties
7.Land Preparation
8.Seed Treatment
9.Seeds & Sowing
10.Nutrient Management
11.Irrigation Management
12.Weed Management
13.Cropping systems
14.Pests & Diseases
15.Yield Attributes
16.Harvesting

3. 17.Yield
18.Storage
19.Post Harvest Technology

4. INTRODUCTION
COMMON NAME-KORRA
SCIENTIFIC NAME-Setaria italica
FAMILY-GRAMINAE
HABITAT-TROPICAL & SUBTROPICAL
It is grown in many of the Asian , African and American countries
especially where the climatic hazards do not permit the cultivation of
other cereals.
It is generally grown as a rainfed crop in India.
It has an erect leafy stem that grow 60-75 cm tall and bend quiet a bit
at maturity due to heavy weight of earhead.

5. BOTANY OF CROP
HABIT : Annual, profusely tillering with jointed nodes, internodes hollow and
shorter at base becoming long above.
ROOT : Fibrous.
STEM : Erect, slender, nodes are solid and slightly hairy. Internodes are shorter at
the base and become longer at the top.
LEAVES : Narrow, linear, leaf sheath longer than internodes; glabrous or hairy,
ligule short, thick, imbricated , prominent midrib.
INFLORESCENCE: Terminal spike like panicle 8 to 22 cm long, drooping, usually
compact, sometimes loose, cylindrical, borne on a thin peduncle. Spikelets have
very short pedicels. Each spikelet or two spikelets subtended at the base by a
number of bristles which are slightly flattened and set with minute and upward
pointing hairs along the edges. Morphologically bristles represent barren floral
branches.

6.  Spikelets two flowered, protected externally by two glumes. The
lower flower sterile, the upper flower perfect, lemma(L1) equal in
length to the spikelets, sterile palea (P1), small membranous. In the
upper florets lemma (L2) is smaller than L1 contains a bisexual
flower, palea (P2) membranous, edges incurved, lodicules two.
 ANDROECIUM: Stamens 3, born on slender filaments and two
lobed.
 GYNOECIUM: Styles two, feathery ends, superior ovary, plumose
stigma.

7. ECONOMIC IMPORTANCE
Korra grain contains
Protein-12.3%
Fat-4.7%
Carbohydrates-60.6%
Ash-3.2%
The grains are fed to cage birds . The straw is thin
stemmed and is liked by cattle . It is not good for horses . In China
, Italian millet is next to raise and wheat in importance . It
provides approximately 15-17% of the total consumed in China.

8. ORIGIN
It is very old crop.
 It was cultivated in China as early as 2700 B.C.
 Vavilov(1935) considered China as its place of
origin.
 Werth considers China or Central Asia as it place of
origin.
 According to him Setaria spread to India and
European countries from there.

9. DISTRIBUTION
 Setaria is cultivated in China , Korea , Japan , Afghanistan ,
Syria , South Africa and India.
 China still ranks first in foxtail millet production in the
world(4.6mt) where as world production is 6mt.
 In India, it is cultivated in A.P , Karnataka , U.P.
 Korra is suitable for dry land cultivation in Anantapur ,
Kurnool , Mahaboobnagar and Rangareddy districts.
 In AP it occupies am area of 1.74 lakh ha . With a total
production of 0.85 lakh tonnes/annum.

10. CLIMATE
 Seteria is cultivated in tropical as well as temperate regions.
 The crops can be grown even at altitude of 200mts.
 It requires moderate temperature throughout its life cycle.
 The crop can be grown successfully in areas receiving 50-70cm annual
rainfall.
 Although its water requirement is low, the plant has no capacity to recover
after a long spell of drought.

11. SOILS
 Setaria requires fairly fertile soils for good yields , although it can grow in poor soils.
 Light soils including red loams , alluvials and black cotton soils are suitable for its
cultivation.
 But it thirves best in rich, well drained loam soils.
Alluvial soilRed soils

12. SEASONS
 It is grown throughout the year from early rainy
season.
 Early rainy season(May).
 Monsoon seasons(June-July).
 Early late seasons(Aug-Sept).
 Irrigated or Summer seasons(Feb-Mar).

13. VARIETIES
Following are the important varieties of the crop:
• Pant setaria-4,
•TNAU-43,
•HMT-100-1,
•SIA-326,
•PS-4,
•K-2,
•K-3,
•Krishna devaraya.

14. LAND PREPARATION
It does not require much field preparation.
Before the onset of monsoon the field should be ploughed once
with mould board plough.
With the onset of monsoon the field should be harrowed or
ploughed with local plough twice.
Planking should be done for making the field smooth and well
levelled.

15. SEED TREATMENT
Treat 1 kg of seeds with .2 g Thiram or Carbendazim.
Seed treated with Ceresan @ 3g/kg of seeds.

16. SEEDS AND SOWING
 Seeds and Sowing:
 Seed rate:5 kg/ha
 Spacing:30*10 cm
 The seeds can be sown with local seed drill with tynes 30 cm apart.
 Covering of the seeds with blade harrow is recommened.
Line sowingSeeds

17. NUTRIENT MANAGEMENT
 The crop is usually manured with10-12 tonnes of FYM per ha.
 To get a good crop,40kg N,30 kg P2O5,and 20 kg K2o/ha is sufficient.
 All the fertilizers should be applied as basal dose at the time of sowing.
 If the irrigation is available apply only half of the dose of N and full amount of
phosphorus and potash at the time of sowing and remaining half quantity of N at
30 DAS.

18. IRRIGATION MANAGEMET
Setaria sown during kharif season , does not require any irrigation.
However ,if dry spell prevails for longer period, then 1 or 2 irrigations may be
given to boost yields.
Summer crop requires 2-5 irrigations depending upon soil type and climatic
conditions.
During rainy season, drainage is essential.
Remove excess rain water from the field as it does not withstand water logged
conditions.

19. WATER REQUIREMENT : 300mm.
IRRIGATION SCHEDULING : First irrigation at 25-30
DAS and second irrigation at 40-45 DAS.
CRITICAL STAGES : Tillering and panicle initiation stage.
IW/CPE RATIO : 0.75.

20. WEED MANAGEMENT
 Keep the field free from weeds.
 Intercultivation should be done with the tyne- harrow when the crop is 30 days old.
 2-3 weedings with hand hoe is sufficient.

21. Post-emergence application of 2,4-D Sodium salt (80%)
@1.0 kg a.i./ha at 20-25 DAS.
Isoproturon @ 1.0 kg a.i./ha as pre-emergence spray is also effective in weeds
control.
IMPORTANT WEEDS:
>Abutilon indicum
>Amranthus spinosus
>Gomphrena celosioides
>Leucas aspera
>Dactyloctenium aegyptium
>Sorghum halepense
>Euphorbia hirta
>Striga litura

23. CROPPING SYSTEMS
Intercropping-
 Foxtail millet + pigeon pea [6:1]
 Foxtail millet + bengalgram
 Foxtail millet + rice
Mixed Cropping:
 Korra-Cotton mixture is of repute in Rayalaseema.
 It is also mixed with Ragi.
 Jowar,bajra,redgram,castor and pulses.
Jowar + foxtail
millet

24. PESTS AND DISEASES
PESTS:
 Army worm , cut worm and leaf scrapping beetle appear occasionally in serious
form. In certain areas shoot fly occur , although it is not a regular pest.
CONTROL : When pests are noticed , take up dusting of Endosulfan 4% @30
kg/ha or Malathion 5% @ 8-10kg/ha.
DISEASES:
Blast(Pyricularia setariae) , Brown Spot(Helmithosporium setariae) , Rust(Uromyces
setariae) appear on the foliage.
CONTROL: Spraying Mancozeb(0.2%) and warrant a spray only if they appear at the
early stages of crop growth.

25. >Grain Smut (Ustilago crameri)
#CONTROL : Treating the seeds with Carboxin or
Carbendazim @ 2 g/kg.
Green Ear (Sclerospora graminicola)
#CONTROL : Treating the seeds with Ridomil Mz @
2g/kg.Rouging out the affected plants.

26. Yield Attributes
Total number of tillers per unit area.
Number of plants per unit area.
Number of productive tillers per unit area.
Length of the panicle.
Number of filled grains per panicle.
Test weight.

27. HARVESTING
 The crop flowers in 50-60 days and matured in 80-100 days.
 The crop is harvested when the earheads are dry either by cutting the whole plant
by sickle or the ears separately.
 After drying for few days threshing is done with a stone roller or by trampling
under the feet of bullocks.
Threshing
Harvesting

28. Yield
 Rainfed crop:Grain-6-10 q/ha
Straw-10-20 q/ha
 Irrigated crop:Grain-10-16 q/ha
Straw-20-40 q/ha

29. STORAGE
 Millet is a good storing grain which will store without any
special considerations for one to two years.
 If you want to put millet into long term storage, package
it inside air-tight containers and use oxygen absorbers.
 Stored in this fashion and put in a cool place , millet
should keep well for many years.

30. POST HARVEST TECHNOLOGY
THRESHING:-It is the removal of grain from harvested plant or plant part.
 Threshing of millet is done manually by women and men.
 It entails beating the millet the millet heads with sticks or clubs repeatedly
until almost all the grains are detached from the heads.
 The beating action may be done either on a mat , canvas or bare ground.
 Inorder to ease the grain collection after beating , sometimes the heads of
millets may be stuffed into bags , prior to beating.
 The straw that remains after threshing may be used as a source of fuel.
 Straw is used as thatching material for traditional houses or used as mulch as
well as animal feed.


31. DRYING:-
 Grains harvested during rainy season may be left to dry
in the field for upto two weeks.
 Further drying if required is completed after threshing on
mats laid down on the sun , or plastic sheets.
 Mechanical drying may be employed to dry but it is
expensive.
 Unheated air drying could also be employed

32. CLEANING:-
 Cleaning refers to separation of contaminants from
produce and complete removal of the contaminants
so that the cleaned produce is from re-
contamination.
 The contaminants may be sand , small stones ,
leaves , shrivelled seeds, off-type and broken seeds
, glumes, sticks , chaff, parts of stem, insects,
animal hair and excreta, matal pieces.

33. PACKAGING & TRANSPORT:-
 After threshing, drying and cleaning millets are bagged
into 100 kg hessian/sisal bags and sealed ready for
transportation to distant markets.
 Sometimes millet grains may be packed in bags sewn
from artificial polythene bags for either transportation
and storage.
 Some farmers transport the millets by wrapping in a
piece of cloth which is loaded on to donkeys and
transported to the homestead.

34. THRESHING,CLEANING AND PACKING.

35. PRESENTED BY:-
L.Ramya and P.Sankeerthana
111718012051,111718012061
NAG-B