Performance of High Yielding Varieties of Sunflower (Helianthus annuus L.) Released for Different States of India

The Field trials on sunlower crop were conducted in different in states of India during the year from 2005-6 to 2006-7. The Regional Stations for Fodder Production and Demonstrations (RSFPD), Government of India, Department of Dairying and Fisheries (DADF) spread allover the country provided all the inputs to conduct the tirals in the On the Farms and on farmers Field (OFTs) and Frontline Demonstrations (FLDs) under their juridiction to evaluate the suitable varieties of sunlower for its sowing season, sowing time, scheduling irrigations vs rainfed conditions of cultivation including other agronomic package of practices.Government of India has strong feed and fodder development organization.Their are several centrally sponsered schems like estabishment of fodder banks, development of forage crops through biotechnology research, minikits distribution in the country. Central government distributed latest variety seeds in the country to a tune of cost of Rs 7.00 crores through all eight RSFPDs. The sunflower is a multi purose crop and may be good source of animal feeds as a un-conventional feed resource. Sunlower can be grown with forage crops also as forage crop based cropping system. RSFPDs organised sunflower trials in different states to evaluate sunflower production in northern and southern parts of India.The varieties released by AICRP (Sunflower) for different regions were selected for field trials. India has tropical and subtropical climate from south to north, respectively.Tamilnadu and Maharastra face the tropical climate while, Haryana, Punjab and Uttar Pradesh experience as a sub-tropical type of climate. Have February to March as spring season in northen states of India. All India released varieties Morden, GAUSUF-15, TNAUSUF-7, DRSF-108 and DRSF-113 were grown at Pantnagar in Uttranchal. Vaiety performed better with seed yield (1820.5 kg/ha). Data shows that oil content (40.4%) was higher in the seeds of cultivar TNAUSUF-7. Maximum plant hieght (163.8 cm) and head diameter (16.2 cm) was higher in the variety DRSF-108.