PHENOLOGICAL CHARACTERIZATION AND YIELD PERFORMANCE OF HILLY BLACK RICE CULTIVARS UNDER YEAR-ROUND CULTIVATION IN PLAIN LAND ECOSYSTEM OF BANGLADESH

Black rice is considered as super food due to its various health benefits to the human being. In Bangladesh this rice is cultivated in a very limited area of Chittagong hill tracts and its cultivation technique in plain land ecosystem is still unknown. Therefore, a study was undertaken to evaluate the performance of few black rice cultivars cultivated year-round in plain land environment. The experiment was performed at the Agronomy Field Laboratory of Bangladesh Agricultural University, Mymensingh. The experiment comprised two factors viz. A) three rice cultivars: Kongnam ene, Gelong ni and Gelong se; and B) Twelve date of transplanting starting from 01 July 2018 to 01 June 2019. The experiment was laid out in a split plot design where date of transplanting was distributed in main plots and rice cultivars were allocated in sub plots. It has been found that cultivar Kongnam ene can be cultivated as a short duration variety as it required only 40 days to panicle initiation, 60 days to flowering and 80 days to harvesting after transplanting. All the three cultivars can be cultivated in all the three seasons viz. aus, aman and boro. The cultivar Gelong ni produced significantly highest grain yield (4.0 t/ha) among the cultivars when transplanted in January (boro season).