Background:
Presently manual harvesting of pigeon pea is adopted in India. It is labour and time consuming and one has to work in scorching heat and in bending posture. It is very tedious job. Moreover, timely harvesting of the crop plays vital in achieving better quality and higher yield. The shortage of labour during harvesting season and varied weather and increased cost of harvesting of the pigeon pea causes great loss to the farmer and therefore farmers should have a better option for harvesting at greater extent. Majority of the farmers in India adopts manual harvesting means due to unavailability better mechanical harvesters. Mechanized harvesting operation will provide better manoeuvres to the farmers. Therefore, a suitable tractor operated harvester for pigeon pea was developed to provide solution to the problem.:
Technology Details:
The urea spraying system has been developed based on field observation data and the standard application rate of urea treatment. The main components used in urea spraying system are urea solution tank, flat fan nozzles, pump, strainer, cut off valve, oil type pressure gauge, boom arm, belt and pulley, etc. The belt and pulley were decided based on required rpm to operate the HTP pump with the help of baler flywheel through tractor PTO power. The baler was operated with tractor PTO power and drawbar hitch point in the field. The baler flywheel was attached with tractor PTO shaft with the help of a universal joint. The urea solution tank was mounted on the baler top section. The field evaluation of urea spraying system was carried out for paddy and wheat straw. The tractor speed was maintained at 2.5 km/h. Urea solution was prepared according to research plan means 6 kg of granular urea was mixed with 100 litres of water for 6% concentration, similar solution for 8%, and 10% concentration level, respectively. The discharge rate was adjusted according to the time interval of bales; dry blocks bale weight and % of moisture level to increase. The urea treated individual bales were wrapped airtight in polyethylene sheet, stack and store for curing period of 21 days. The urea treated and untreated samples of paddy and wheat straw were sent to ICAR-NIANP, Bangalore, for nutritional analysis in paddy and wheat season. Some analysis conducted on feed include; crude protein (CP), total ash, neutral detergent fiber (NDF), acid detergent fiber (ADF), dry matter digestibility (DMD), organic matter digestibility (OMD), metabolizable energy (ME) are also analyzed keeping in view the nutritional quality and feed safety. Due to an optimum increase in CP, IVDMD and IVOMD of treated straw, 8% UC at 50 % moisture level can be recommended for baling for paddy straw. Income from treated bales is calculated to be 10000 RS/ha and the cost of urea treatment of straw is 0.50 Rs/kg.