According to current Indian government data, India is the largest producer of Turmeric globally along with the most percentage of exportation of Turmeric in the world.
Andhra Pradesh(Now Telangana) is the only state in India that holds around 37% of the total production of turmeric in India alone.
Among all the spices, Turmeric is one of the most general and basic spices in all the Indian country dishes.
Let's understand how turmeric crop cultivation is a practice by farmers followed by this table of content.
Dry turmeric cultivation
Turmeric plant
Every plant contains a bigger turmeric output by small seeds/cuttings.
Small seeds/cuttings/sprouts of turmeric produce a thin smooth stem plant with fewer leaves. The leaves are the same color as banana leaves but different in shape. These leaves are pointy at the end.
Turmeric cultivation duration
In tropical regions, the best time for sowing Turmeric is the late March to the first week of May.
A Turmeric plant becomes ready to harvest after a season as Rabi or Kharif crop. But sometimes, it takes more than that up to 10 months.
During this time, turmeric sprouts face different temperatures, humidity, and climate change conditions.
More than that, after harvesting Turmeric, it is just not ready to use directly. Instead, its drying is important to have better storage in the future.
Requirements for turmeric cultivation
Temperature and humidity
Turmeric cultivation starts in the summer season and is harvest in the next 6 to 10 months. In this period, temperature and humidity change three times as summer, rainy, and winter seasons.
At the time of sowing, minimum temperature is required 30 to 37 degrees Celcius. For mid growth temperature decrease to 24 to 28 degrees Celcius and for harvesting, it is required to have a temperature between 17 to 22 degrees Celcius.
On the other side, humidity decrease in this period too. In summers, mostly, 40 to 45% of humidity is all right for Turmeric cultivation. In the Rainy season, it increases rapidly to 55 to 90%. In winters, it decreases and keeps on 15 to 25% in the air.
Rain and climate
The best region for high quality and productive Turmeric yield, where at least 10 to 20 mm of rainfall happens per day in the Rainy season.
Therefore in this four-month Rainy season period, 1000 to 1500 mm rain is perfect for Turmeric cultivation.
It is noticed that 300 to 500 meters height from sea level region is beneficial and more helpful to practice Turmeric cultivation.
Turmeric cultivation methods
Preparation of soil beds/land
The best method to sow bigger seeds/cuttings during cultivation is soil bed preparation.
Let's understand how to make soil beds?
Soil beds are basic platforms beds to provide extra comfort to grow any crop.
These soil beds made of a mixture of compost fertilizers and moist soil.
Before the preparation of soil beds, soil pH and TDS confirmation are important. The amount of compost depends on the requirement to maintain pH and TDS of soil for particular seeds/crops.
First, cultivation land plows with possible plowing tools or machines. After plowing, water showering makes the soil moister. The quantity of water showering is depends on the particular requirement.
For Turmeric 10000 to 15000 liters of water/acre is required to maintain the moisture before sowing seeds.
After one week, mix the organic compost or any suggested fertilizer according to the the region and soil type. Plow the land once again and it will mix the soil with compost.
Now, with the help of labor or machines soil beds of 1.5 feet wider and longer according to your land.
Sowing of Tumeric seeds
Treatment of turmeric seeds/cuttings
Before sowing the Turmeric seeds, their treatment is required to avoid the later plants from any kind of fungus or infection diseases.
This treatment can do by organic methods. After collecting all the cuttings/seeds or Turmeric, cover them with moist soil and organic liquid compost. For 20 kg seeds, 100 to 120 kg of moist soil and 50 kg liquid compost are required.
Later cover them with dry soil layer and let it alone for at least one week to 10 days.
After this period, wash them in a 1/100 liter of dilute aqua mixture of homemade organic sour(like Neem) for 5 to 10 minutes and seeds/cuttings become ready for sowing.
The line to line distance
Every line or column of soil bed must be on a gap of at least half of feet. From the center of the soil bed, the line to line distance must be 2 feet at least.
Plant to plant distance
Every plant to plant distance should be wider because turmeric plants expands in comparison to other seasonal crops.
Therefore, every plant to plant distance must be at least half of a foot and maximum of 1 foot.
Composting stages
The best fertilizer without any side effect is organic compost in liquid form.
There are several stages of growth of plants when they need fertilizers at a particular point, this is called composting.
At a time, liquid compost must provide at the root section of plants to get better results. Let's understand it for Turmeric in the following terms-
- First composting- After 35 to 40 days from sowing(first appearance of the green plant)
- Second composting- After 65 to 75 days from sowing(young plant and growth)
- Third composting- After 95 to 100 days of sowing(Mature plant and growing yield in roots)
- Fourth composting- After 150 days of sowing and 30 to 40 days before harvesting.
For a square meter area, 15 liters of liquid organic compost is required. Hence for 1-acre land, 60000 liters of liquid compost is required during the entire cultivation.
Irrigation for Turmeric
- First irrigation- After 7 days of sowing
- Second irrigation- After 15 days of sowing
- Third irrigation- After 22 days of sowing
- Continuous irrigation till first 70 days on the difference of per 7 to 10 days.
- The Rainy season will automatically provide water for later growth.
For the first 70 days, per square meter area required 30 liters of water till Rainy season. For per acre of land, 120,000 liters of water is required till Rainy season.
Weeding of spontaneous plants
Weeding is as important as irrigation. Because of moisture, it is obvious that spontaneous plants grow everywhere they get moisture.
Surely, moisture in the soil(from irrigation of water), is the reason for the appearence of spontaneous plants.
In Turmeric cultivation, small unnecessary plants absorb the compost/fertilizers elemtents before Turmeric plants. Thus they resist the growth.
To avoid such unnecessary plants, their cleaning/removal is important.
Following are days count from the day of sowing, to remove the spontaneous plants/weeding-
- First weeding- After 30 days of sowing
- Second weeding- After 65 days of sowing
- Third weeding- After 120 days of sowing
Harvesting of Turmeric
With all the implementation and proper care, Turmeric becomes ready to harvest after ... days. The ordinary way to collect them is to pull out the whole plant with the roots.
In modern farming methods, Turmeric harvesting is done by heavy machines in very little time. These machines clean the land too with the collection of yield.
After separation of turmeric from the plants, their cleaning and drying is important to store them. After the cleaning of moist or dry soil, these need to get dry in direct sunlight.
Mortality rate in Turmeric cultivation
It is obvious some portion of any cultivation get waste or get mortal due to some reasons. We don't get 100% output from sowing seeds.
Mostly, in seasonal crops, mortatlity rate of plants remain 15 to 20%. But with small period crops, it can increase upto 30%. All because of implementation of right methods and use of proper fertilziers and pesticides.
Surprisingly, if everything does well according to cultivation rules, then around 90% out of Turmeric can produce by total sowing seeds/cuttings/sprouts.