ASTER

Aster is greek word which mean star i.e. flower head is star shape. It belongs to the family of Asteraceae. It is Popular as cut flower and grown through out world. Aster comes in various shape and color i.e. scarlet, white, pink, rose and blue.  The flowers are 1-1.5 inch in diameter and the plant attains the height of 1-2 feet.

It give good result when cultivated on well drained red loamy soils. For good growth, it required ideal pH of 6 to 7.

Kamini: It has deep pink color flowers which is more attractive than The Local Pink variety.  The stalk length of flower is 30cm and the flower has an average life span of 7 days. The flowers having a diameter of 6cm and weight of 2gm. The single plant produces average of 50 flowers.

Phule Ganesh Violet: Semi spreading early variety. Dark violet colors flowers. Flowering period is for four to five months.
  
Phule Ganesh Purple: High yielding variety. Flowers are light purple color. 

Phule Ganesh White: Flowers are white and with long stalk. Flowering period is for four to five months. 
 
Phule Ganesh Pink: Early and semi spreading variety with attractive pink color. 

Violet Cushion

Shashank

Poornima

American beauty

Crego

Star dust

Los angels
 

Plough land thouroughly and bring soil to fine tilth. For seed sowing, prepared flat raised beds.

Time of sowing
It is winter season crop, complete cultivation in September – October month.

Spacing
Transplant seedlings on bed at spacing of 20x15cm.

Sowing Depth
For seed sowing used raised bed of 120x60x10cm dimension. On raised bed, sow seed at depth of 0.5cm.

Method of sowing
Transplant seedlings of 30-35days old in main field.
 

Seed Rate
For sowing one acre land use seed rate of 1 to 1.2kg/acre.
 

Nutrient Requirement (kg/acre)

Fertilizer Requirement (kg/acre)

For accurate fertilizer dose alwase apply fertilizer on the basis of soil test result.

In absence of it, apply Nitrogen@70kg, Phosphorus and Potash@24kg/acre in form of Urea@155kg, SSP@150kg and MOP@40kg per acre.

At time of land preparation, apply half of Nitrogen, full dose of Phosphoros and potash along with well decomposed cowdung@6-8ton/acre. Apply remaining amount of nitrogen 40-45days after transplanting. 
 

Depending upon moisture contained of soil, apply irrigation at interval of five to six days.

Depending upon weed intensity, take two to three weeding operations.

Pinching: To induced lateral shoots,  pinching of growing tips is carried out, 30days after transplantation. 
 

In Aster, flowering starts in two to three month after transplantation. Pluck flowers along with stalked. Then tied them in bundles.