et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License -NonCommercial-ShareAlike Unported License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/). Influence of different sources of fertilizers and weed control treatments on growth, phenology, and yield of baby corn (Zea mays L.) in semi-arid of India Mustapha Na-Allah Sale*, Gurpreet Singh, Sandeep Menon, Jayanti Yomso Department of Agronomy, Lovely Professional University, Punjab, India. ABSTRACT The field research work was conducted at the teaching and research farm, Department of Agronomy lovely professional university, Punjab during 2021 Kharif season. The research aimed to determine the best fertilizer combination and weed control method for increasing baby corn production. The growth and phenological attributes such as leaf area, leaf area index, days to 50% tasselling, silking, and yield attributes such as cob length, weight, and yield (unhusked) were higher in the application of poultry dropping 1.55 t/ha + 125% RDN in comparison with the remaining treatments. In weed control methods, significantly lower dry weight of weed and maximum weed control efficiency were observed in the post-emergence application of tembotrione 100 mL/ha compared to the weedy check. In addition to these, highest mean values for growth and phenological attributes such as leaf area, leaf area index, days to 50% tasselling, silking, and yield attributes such as cob length, cob weight, and unhusked cob yield per hectare were also recorded in the post-emergence application of Tembotrione 100 mL/ha. The study concludes that poultry manure at 1.55 t/ha + 125% RDN and post-emergence application of tembotrione at 100 mL/ha are most effective for weed control and better yield of baby corn. 1. INTRODUCTION Baby corn is a vegetable picked from regular maize or sweet corn plants when the ears are still premature and immediately after the emergence of white silk (2–3 cm) length. It is a short season maize variety that can be grown throughout the year. It is highly adapted to a wide range of vegetation and is among the most important maize varieties grown for diet for humans and feed for animals. Besides a higher plant population density, detasseling, and an early harvest, baby corn production is comparable to standard grain maize cultivation. The crop requires well-drained and sandy loam to silty loam soils for optimum growth and development. The crop potential economy increases when harvested earlier because it provides green, soft, succulent, nourishing, palatable, and more easily digestible fodder. The cobs from a baby corn crop take about 60–65 days to mature, and the rest of the plant can be utilized as green fodder. The young ear is de-husked, eaten raw as a salad, and used to make vegetables, pickles, and soup. The nutritional value of baby corn is similar to that of several vegetables, including cauliflower, cabbage, tomato, and radish. After harvest, the economic potential is increased, because it provides green, soft, and succulent nutritious palatable fodder with higher digestibility [1]. The cultivation *Corresponding Author: Mustapha Na-Allah Sale, Department of Agronomy, Lovely Professional University, Punjab, India. E-mail: mustaphanaallah@gmail.com of the crop is gaining interest in India with increasing production in the states such as Meghalaya, Haryana, Maharashtra, Karnataka, and Andhra Pradesh. Farmers are becoming more interested in baby production due to its low production costs, high domestic demand, promising market, potential value addition, support for the domestic economy, and higher revenue [2]. Despite the low cost of production and high yield potential of this crop, the yield in the farmer’s field is relatively low. Due to numerous factors such drought, pests, diseases, weeds infestation, and soil fertility problems, among others, weeds and fertility problems become a serious threat to crop productivity. Weed is among the factors that pose a serious menace to crop production. It hinders crop growth by competing with the crop for nutrients, solar radiation, moisture, and carbon dioxide, reducing baby corn yield and interfering with normal crop growth. According to Larbi et al., [3] weed interference causes crop losses. It increases insect pest damage, harvesting problems, crop contamination, and production costs. Manual weeding is the most popular weed control method among peasant farmers in India; it is tedious, slow and ineffective, and sometimes costly. Thus, the use of selective herbicides on baby corn, such as atrazine, pendimethalin, and tembotrione or their combinations, is necessary for better crop productivity. Chemical fertilizers to restore soil fertility are costly and in short supply. Furthermore, quantity requirement and cost of transportation of organic manure are serious concerns resulting in the application of alternatives such as poultry manure and nitrogen Available online at http://www.jabonline.in ARTICLE INFO Article history: Received on: August 10, 2022 Accepted on: October 06, 2022 Available online: *** Key words: Baby corn, Weed, Tasselling, Silking, Poultry manure, Phenology. © 2023 Sale, Journal of Applied Biology & Biotechnology Vol. X(XX), pp. 1-7, 2023 DOI: 10.7324/JABB.2023.102093