Soil –
Rich red-loamy soil with a pH range of 5.5-7.0 is preferred.
Climate –
It is a tropical and subtropical crop. It thrives well with a mean annual temperature of 30-350C. It requires well distributed rainfall of 1000-1500 mm spread over a period of 6-8 months, with humid and warm weather during vegetative phase and with cool and dry weather during the corm development period.
Weeding and earthing up as and when necessary.
1) Collar rot-
The disease is caused by a soil borne fungus Schlerotium rolfsii. Water logging, poor drainage and mechanical injury at collar region favour the disease incidence. Brownish lesions first occur on collar regions, which spreads to the entire pseudostem and cause complete yellowing of the plant. In severe case, the plant collapses leading to complete crop loss.
Use disease free planting material, remove infected plant materials, improve drainage conditions, incorporate organic amendments like neem cake, drench the soil with carbendazim (1g/l of water). or apply biocontrol agents like Trichoderma harzianum @ 2.5 kg/ha mixed with 50 kg of FYM.
30 – 35 t/ha in 240 days.
For seed purpose, the yams can be left in the field itself till planting the next crop or the lifted yams can be stored in sand or paddy straw.