Horticulture: Principles and Practices

This book is a meticulous presentation of fundamental principles of Horticulture and it gradually transcends and culminates to advanced technologies. It will be a ready reckoner, which will be useful to provide ready tips to any undergraduate faculty.
Chapter 1 to chapter 4 give a broad description of fundamentals in horticultural sciences and the institutes involved in furthering the interest of horticulture. Chapters 5 to chapter 14 explainab out the tools, inputs and techniques used in crop management. Chapters 16 to chapter 19 deal with use of growth regulators, protected cultivation, good agricultural practices and organic horticulture. With the increase in pollution, people are keen to produce their own vegetables and chapter 20 focuses on that need of people. Chapter 21 provides an insight to applied biotechnology related to horticulture viz., micro propagation and genetic engineering. The chapters 22 and 23 shed light on the scope of aesthetic aspects of horticulture. Horticulture therapy is a novel concept to deal with present day health issues and this is explained in chapter 24. Climate change and irresponsible human behavior has caused stress conditions for crop growth and it is adequately dealt in chapter 25.
It is estimated that at least 20 - 30 % of the horticulture produce is wasted as post-harvest loss and hence chapter 26 and 27 are designed to provide post-harvest handling and value addition.