• An extent of 4 cents nursery will be needed to raise seedlings required to plant one hectare.
• Nursery land should be fertile, free from weeds.
• Nursery should be ploughed thoroughly and brought to the fine tilth condition for better seed germination and seedling growth.
• Good irrigation and proper drainage facilities should be available.
• Nursery area should be open so that full sunshine may be available throughout the day from morning to evening.
• Equal quantity of sand and well decomposed FYM are mixed with soil and raised beds of 60-75 cm width and of convenient length are prepared.
• These beds are sterilised by burning crop residues or treated with solution of 100 g of blue copper dissolved in 40 litres of water or by solarization.

• Solarization is a process to increase the soil temperature and humidity in the nursery bed in order to eliminate the harmful pathogens and nematodes in soil.
• The nursery bed should be covered with a thick polythene sheet for a period of two weeks.

• About 380-400 gram of seeds are required to raise seedlings to plant one hectare.
• Seeds should be treated with fungicides like captan/Thiram @ 3 g/kg and biofungicide, Trichoderma viride @ 4 g/kg of seeds, 24 hours prior to sowing.

• The seeds (400 g ) are sown in an area of 4 cents nursery in lines drawn at a spacing of 10 cm across the beds and covered with top soil.
• Immediately, the beds are covered by plaited coconut fronds and a layer of paddy straw or dried grass and then watered by rose can.
• Watering is essential twice a day (morning and evening) to ensure better germination.
• Seeds germinate in 5-7 days.
• Seedling should be hardened before transplanting.
• The seedlings will be ready for transplanting in 40-50 days or when they are about six inches height, with 4-6 leaves stage.

• Irrigate the fields copiouslly one day prior to transplanting.
• Apply 2 kg Azospirillum mixed in 40 kg of powdered farmyard manure, along the ridges evenly for one hectare, at the time of transplating.
• Forty to forty-five days old seedlings are transplanted at a spacing of 75 x 60 cm manually with the help of hand and watered copiously.
• Press the soil firmly around roots to eliminate air pocket.
• It is advisable to transplant the seedlings preferably during the evening hours to protect from glaring hot sun.

There are four main sowing seasons for growing brinjal.

• First season : June-July
• Second season : September-October
• Third season : February-March
• Fourth season : April-May

• Season : June - July
• Seed rate : 450 g/ha.
• Nursery preparation : 15 days before sowing drench the nursery with Metham sodium @ 28ml/sq.m (VEPAM) for controlling the nematodes. After 7 days, drench with Fytolan @ 2.5g /lit of water against damping off disease.
• Age of seedling : 30-35 days.
• Fertilizers
  Basal
  FYM : 25 t/ha, 50:75:75kg NPK/ha.
  Top dressing : 50kg N/ha just before flowering.
• Spacing : 75x60cm
• Foliar application : NAA @ 20ppm at 65 and 75 days after transplanting.
• Harvest : Seeds attain maturity in 40-45 days after flowering. The symptom of harvestable maturity is turning of the skin colour from green to bright yellow. Medium size fruits yield more quantity and quality seed than big or small fruits.
• Seed extraction : The well-ripened fruits are cut into 4 - 6 pieces and softened by soaking in water overnight. On extraction the floaters are removed.
• Grading : Sieve size : 5/64" round perforated metal sieve or BSS 12x12 wire mesh sieve (2.1mm)
• Seed yield : 250kg/ha

Storage : Treat the seeds with Carbendazim 50% WP @ 2g/kg seed and Halogen formulation (Bleaching powder + CaCO₃ + Arappu leaf powder @ 5:4:1) @ 3g/kg seed and store upto 1 year in cloth bag and upto 2 years in moisture vapour proof containers.

Brinjal, a non-seasonal important vegetable crop is grown allover India throughout the year, in an area of 0.45 million ha had recorded about 5.8 million tonnes of production. Seed is one of the important inputs and plays a key role in the productivity and production of any crop and brinjal too. At present, seeds are extracted from brinjal fruits, manually by beating the fruits with mallet, trampling under feet, squeezing with hands, splitting the fruits and scooping seeds, etc. The manual methods of extraction of seed are tedious, highly time and labour consuming process. Sometimes delayed seed extraction resulted in decreased seed quality and increased cost. Keeping this in view, a new gadget for the extraction of seeds from brinjal has been developed.

The brinjal seed extractor consists of a fruit crushing chamber and seed separation unit. In the fruit crushing chamber, 70 mm length crushing rods are fixed in the shaft which crushes the fruit into pulp with the help of feed water and discharges the same into the bottom portion of the seed separation unit. The seed separation unit houses a horizontal sieve bottom, sloping solid bottom below the sieve bottom, seed outlet, agitator, pulp outlet and drain cock. The inclined bottom of the seed separation unit helps for easy collection of seeds towards the seed outlet. Seeds are collected along with water by opening the value and keeping a sieve tray with 3 mm holes. The brushes fixed in the agitator move over the sieve surface, remove the lodged seeds if any and keep the sieve always clean for easy passage of seeds through the sieve.

The brinjal fruit pulp with seeds is introduced into the seed separation unit at the bottom in a standing column of water. The rotating agitator with radial arms, agitates and separates the denser healthy seeds from pulp and ill filled light seeds. Due to the difference in specific weight, the good seeds are moving towards the bottom, pass through the sieve and get collected through seed outlet. The lighter pulp and other ill filled seeds rise to the surface and discharged through the pulp outlet.

• Capacity of the unit is 120 kg of fruits or 2 kg of seeds per hour.
• The cost of the unit is Rs.15,000/-.
• The cost of seed extraction is Rs.1 01- per kg of seed.
• Savings in cost is 88.9%
• Savings in time is 97.5%.

• Varieties : Arka Navneet, Suphal, Ajay, Vijay, Kirti, Mhb1, Mhb2, Mhb3, Mhb9, Kalpatharu, Ravayya.
• Season : Planted during May-June, October-November, November, January - February.
• Seed rate : 200 gm/ha.
• Spacing : 90x60cm
• Number of plants : 18,520 /ha.
• Farmyard Manure : 25 Tons / ha
• Fertilizers N:P:K : 200:150:100 kg/ha
• Average fruit weight : 200 - 500gm
• Total crop duration : 150 days
• Average yield : 25 tons/ha