Effect of Vermicompost and Vermicompost Tea on Sweetcorn Physiology and Fall Armyworm (Spodoptera Frugiperda) Infestation

Vermicompost and its extract vermicompost tea are considered black gold because they improve plant physiology, making them more resistant to pests and diseases and requiring less pesticide use. Sweet corn is heavily affected by pests especially fall armyworms requiring a lot of pesticide spray times to yield profits for farmers. This study aimed to examine the effect of vermicompost and vermicompost tea on 1) the growth rate and the changes in plant physiology of sweet corn and 2) increase of resistance to fall armyworm infestation in sweet corn. Sweetcorn was planted in six differently treated beds, where the treatments imposed are, T1 - organic manure. T2 - Vermicompost (1 ton/acre) only. T3 - vermicompost tea (20%) only, T4 - vermicompost (1 ton/acre) and vermicompost tea (20%); T5 -vermicompost (3 ton/acre) only, T6 - vermicompost (3 ton/acre) and vermicompost tea (20%). The SPAD, Fluorometer and Porometer, and Unmanned Aerial Vehicle were used to study the chlorophyll, conductance, fluorescence and biomass content of the plants. The readings were taken at the sweet corn vegetative stages of V2, V4, V6, and V8. The ranges of SPAD, stomatal conductance, and Chlorophyll fluorescence readings were 23.47 to 28.07, 0.03 to 0.2, and 117.86 to 149.94, respectively, with the highest observations from treatments T5 and T6. For Fall armyworm (FAW) infestation, the pest was first seen in T2 at the V2 stage, but the destructive foliar effect started at V4. The FAW infestation was in the order T3>T1>T5>T6>T2>T4, showing that treatments with both vermicompost and vermicompost tea were the least affected. To understand which treatments had more weed cover, supervised classification was done on UAV imagery, and the weed cover was seen most in T4 and less in T1 and T5. It can then be concluded that vermicompost and vermicompost tea improve the physiology of sweetcorn and reduce the FAW infestation.