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It is used in the control of bacterial leaf spots, blights, and cankers mostly on fruits crops and ornamentals. The Bordeaux mixture, however, can cause burning of leaves or russeting of fruit such as apples when applied in cool, wet weather. The phytotoxicity of Bordeaux is reduced by increasing the ratio of hydrated lime to copper sulfate. Copper is the only ingredient in the Bordeaux mixture that is toxic to pathogens and, sometimes, to plants, whereas the role of lime is primarily that of a “safener.”

Plant viruses cause severe crop losses worldwide. Conventional control strategies, such as cultural methods and biocide applications have limited success at mitigating the impact of plant viruses.

Nematodes are multicellular, unsegmented, bilaterally symmetrical roundworms belonging to pseudocoelomates class of creatures. Many of them are parasites of plants. Different crops species are susceptible to several species of plant parasitic nematodes which limits the yield and quality of the food harvest. Root-knot nematodes (Meloidogyne spp.), foliar nematodes (Aphelenchoides spp.), root-lesion nematodes (Pratylenchus spp.) reniform nematodes (Rotylenchulus spp.) and other ectoparasitic nematodes are the important nematodes species to infect the crop plants.

The algae associated with the plants belongs to the Order Trentepohliales (Ulvophyceae, Chlorophyta). These are filamentous green algae parasitic to higher plants, generally causing minor diseases characterized by negligible leaf spots, but on certain crops, in moist environments, these algal diseases can cause economic injury to plant leaves, fruits, and stems (Nelson, 2008).

Protozoan parasites are Trypanosomatids of the class Kinetoplastida predominately restricted to invertebrate hosts (i.e. possess a monoxenous lifecycle). However, several genera are pathogenic to humans, animals and plants, and have an invertebrate vector that facilitates their transmission (i.e. possess a dixenous life-cycle).

Seed is a basic input to raise the crop plants. Healthy seeds produces the healthy crop. However, the seed carries different pathogens either externally or sometimes internally in the seed to affect the seed emergence and healthy seedling growth. Therefore, the seed treatment with fungicides/bactericides, based on the infection of the pathogen, is highly essential to counter the attack and infection of these pathogens to the germinating seedlings.

Proper selection of plant health medicines like fungicide, bactericide, antibiotics, algaecide, viricide, nematicide, weedicide, plant harmones and auxins and its application at the correct dose and the proper time are highly essential for the management of plant health. The basic requirement of an application method is that it delivers the chemical to the site where the active compound will prevent the pathogen/pest damaging the plant. 

Plant growth regulators or phytohormones are organic substances produced naturally in higher plants, controlling growth or other physiological functions at a site remote from its place of production and active in minute amounts. Thimmann in1948 proposed the term Phytohormone as these hormones are synthesized in plants (Thimmann, 1963).

Anti-transpirants are usually foliar sprays, although they may sometimes be used more conveniently as dips for immersing the above ground plant parts. Foliar sprays may reduce transpiration in three different ways

The use of flower inducers stimulates flower growth during the resting year so the tree produces annually. Flower inducers can also increase the number of viable blooms during the natural fruit producing year, for an increase in production. These can also be used on varieties that provide a crop every year, to boost harvest.

Fruit drop just before harvest is a serious problem for various crop varieties. The severity of fruit drop is influenced by several factors but plant stress and premature ethylene production is at the basis of true physiological drop. Stress factors such as late season heat, primary and secondary pest infestation, and nutrient imbalance or deficiency, and heavy summer pruning, all can contribute to drop.

Sixteen chemical elements are known to be important for a plant growth, their metabolic activities and survival. These can be divided in to two main groups

Medicines used for controlling insect pests are known as Pesicides which have assumed great importance in today’s high yielding and intensive agricultural system as well as public health programme, all over the world. The term pesticide is an all-inclusive word meaning killer of pests and includes substances used for controlling, preventing, destroying, repelling or mitigating any pest.

Pyrethrum is the most widely used botanical insecticide. The active ingredient, pyrethrin, is extracted from a chrysanthemum plant, grown primarily in Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Ecuador. Pyrethrum is the powdered, dried flower head of the pyrethrum daisy, Chrysanthemum cinerariaefolium.

Nereistoxin (NTX) was originated from a marine annelid worm Lumbriconereis heteropoda and its analogue pesticides (table 51) including cartap, bensultap, thiocyclam and thiobensultap have been commonly used in agriculture, because of their low toxicity and high insecticidal activity.

Slugs and snails occasionally cause serious damage to seedlings, tender, lowgrowing leafy vegetables; or ripening fruit that are on the ground. Feeding damage, hollowed-out areas, can be found anywhere on fruit, but is usually concentrated near the stem. Slugs leave a tell tale slime trail (silvery trail) behind on the surface of fruit or leaves.

The application of insecticide to control a particular crop pest should have options of the pesticides, as some may be less effective than other due to various reasons.

Many chemical and visual lures attract insects and therefore can be used as attractants to monitor or directly catch and reduce insect populations. These attractants are used in ways that do not injure other animals or humans or result in residues on foods or feeds, and can be used in an environmentally sound manner in pest management programs.

A number of plant substances have been considered for use as insect antifeedants or repellents, but apart from some natural mosquito repellents, little commercial success has ensued for plant substances that modify arthropod behavior. Several factors appear to limit the success of botanicals, most notably regulatory barriers and the availability of competing products that are cost-effective and relatively safe compared with their predecessors.

Weeds can be defined as plants which are undesirable, persistent, damaging and interfere with growth of other crop plants thus affecting agriculture, natural resources and economy of the country. These plants influence the produce of farmers in several ways.

Biological control or biocontrol is a method of controlling pests such as insects, mites, weeds and plant diseases using other organisms. It relies on predation, parasitism, herbivory, or other natural mechanisms, but typically also involves an active human management role. It can be an important component of integrated pest management (IPM) programs.

The United States of America (USA), European Union (EU), Brazil and China are four of the largest agricultural producers and users of agricultural pesticides in the world. Comparing the inclination and ability of different regulatory agencies to ban or eliminate pesticides that have the most potential for harm to humans and the environment can provide a glimpse into the effectiveness of each nation’s pesticide regulatory laws and oversight.

Crop: Plants grown in association, sown (or planted) and also harvested by human being, are collectively known as crop.
Crop plants have some economic values and there is an interaction or competition among the plants.

System is a set of principles or procedures according to which management is done; it is an organized scheme or method. A system is a group of interrelated or interacting elements (crops or livestock) that act according to a set of rules to form a unified whole.

Definition: Agro-forestry is a land use system where woody perennials (or trees) are deliberately grown in conjunction with field crops, horticultural crops and pasture, with the objective of meeting various requirements of the farmers from the farm; it also acts as an insurance against the risk of uncertain / abnormal weather condition

The main objective of cropping system is to utilize the available resources in an efficient manner. There are several indices to evaluate the yield advantage of cropping system and also to compare the efficiency of different cropping system in terms of land use.

Till date, there is no complete agreement on the terms used in cropping system. An attempt was made to standardize the terms and their usage at the symposium on Multiple Cropping held by the American Society of Agronomy, in Knoxville, Tennessee, during August, 1975. Some definitions published in the proceeding (Andrews and Kassam, 1976) which forms the basis for the improvement and additions of definitions made subsequently (Francis, 1989). The terms commonly used in cropping system and their definitions are given in the following paragraphs.

‘Hydroponics’ technique was first developed on commercial scale as early as in 1930 by

A. De. Condole             B. J.D. Hooker

C. W.F. Greicke            D. Hugo De Vries

The response of a plant to the relative length of day and night is called as

A. Photosynthesis      B. Phytochrome

C. Photoperiodism     D. Photo respiration

Plant propagation by means of seed is called ________ propagation.

A. Sexual          B. Parthenocarpy

C. Asexual        D. Apomixis

Organic soils contain _____ % or more of organic matter.

A. 10       B. 15

C. 20      D. 30

The practice of smoking the trees to induce off-season crops in mango is

A. Smudging      B. Bending

C. Ringing         D. Notching

India ranks ___________ in area and production of vegetables in the world.

A. First           B. Second

C. Third         D. Fourth

The scientific horticulture consists of the following divisions. Among them, which division has impact on environment aesthetically and functionally

A. Fruits         B. Flowers

C. Spices       D. Plantations

The products of the plants which are used as food adjuncts to add taste only is called

A. Spices                   B. Medicinal plants

C. Aromatic plants     D. Condiments

Where is the Central Institute for Medicinal & Aromatic Plants situated at?

A. Srinagar        B. Bengaluru

C. Anand           D. Lucknow

The storage life of fresh lemon at 10ºC is

A. 6-10 weeks           B. 10-15 weeks

C. 12-20 weeks        D. 12-16 weeks

———————— is a thornless and seedless selection from Kagzi lime.

A. Pramalini            B. Vikram

C. Chakradhar        D. Jai devi

Over the last decade, area under horticultural crops grew by 2.60% per annum and production 4.8% per annum. During 2017-18 total 311.71 million tonnes horticultural crops were harvested from 25.43 million hectare area. India is 2nd largest producer of fruits in the world after China, with average productivity at 14.97 t/ha. Fruits alone were cultivated almost in 6.5 million hectare area and production of 97.38 million metric tons, (Anonymous, 2018).

Tree canopy management affects fruit yield and quality by affecting light interception. The canopy geometry should be managed in such a way that it intercepts maximum light. For high density planting system a shallow (thin) canopy 1.5-2.0 m in depth is needed to achieve the maximum efficiency for trapping sun energy through foliage and channelizing metabolites for quality fruit production with good return.

Canopy manipulation in fruit crops has a seasonal and a life-time development pattern and have lifelong advantage and disadvantage. The unmanaged canopy of fruit trees poses many difficulties i.e. difficulty in spray, pruning and hand harvesting, poor light penetration and interception throughout the canopy. Low early light interception, leaf area index and fraction of land covered by canopy, leading to delayed and poor cropping.

Mango (Mangifera indica) is one of the least professionally grown fruit crop globally. It is popularly known as ‘King of Fruits’ belongs to family Anacardiaceae. It is being cultivated for at least 4000 years (Crane, 2008). As per estimate total world mango production is 40 million tones.

Grape is one of the important fruit, crops being grown in area of 79.6 thousand hectare with annual production 1878.3 thousand MT. India is a major exporting country of grapes, it exported fresh grapes 24633.79 MT (2018-19) (Anonymous, 2018).

Banana and plantain (Musa spp.) are one of the most important commercial food crops especially in tropical regions. Banana by virtue of its multiple uses is popularly known as ‘Kalpataru’. Apart from fresh consumption as desert fruit, some types are also used for culinary purposes. It has therapeutic value; ripe banana is easily digestible and has vitamins and minerals.

The guava (Psidium guajava L.) also known as ‘the apple of tropics’ belongs to family Myrtaceae (Hayes, 1974) originated from Tropical South America stretching from Mexico to Peru and introduced in India by Portuguese during 17th century (Bose and Mitra, 2001). Guava is an evergreen fruit in nature, well adopted to a wide range of soil and agro-climates and acclaimed as ‘super fruit, due to high nutraceutical properties and in reach of poor people it has great demand.

India stands 3rd position in citrus production in world after China and Brazil. It is the most important fruit crops grown in India, however, our productivity is quite low 8.9 t/ha (Srivastava and Singh, 2006).

Apple (Malus domestica Borkh) is a typical temperate fruit; more than 80% world supply is being made from Europe (Tukey, 1982). It occupies more than 85% area and 60 % production of total temperate fruits. As per 2017-18 statistics it was cultivated over an area of 30,1000 ha with 23,27,000 metric tons production (Anonymous, 2018). Austria is leading in apple productivity; however, China is a largest producer in world.

The common pear (Pyrus communis) is known as French Pear, Asian pear also called Chinese pears, Japanese pears, Oriental pears, sand pear, salad pears and apple and pear are group of pome fruits derived from Pyrus ussuriensis and Pyrus serotina. Pyrus communis is susceptible to fireblight disease, however, Pyrus pyrifolia is resistant to this disease. Pear is only temperate fruit grown on the hills to southern parts of India. Jammu and Kashmir is leading in quality pear production.

Peach (Prunus persica L. Batsch) is a small to medium sized open topped branches, medium stocky, spreading as well as upright growth habit. The Peach is the native of (china, currently around 3000 peach cultivars are available in the world over (Faust and Timon, 1995).