Davana (Artemisia pallens Wall ex. D.C.) is an important high valued annual medicinal and aromatic herb of India belonging to the family Asteraceae. An experiment was conducted at Department of Seed Science and Technology, Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, Coimbatore during 2011 to optimize the age of seedling for transplanting Davana to maximize the growth, herbage yield seed yield and seed quality attributes of Davana. The experiment was laid out with five different transplanting age of seedlings viz., 25-, 30-, 35-, 40- and 45-day-old seedlings in pot culture. The results revealed that 35-day-old seedlings exhibited better growth in terms of survival percentage (90%), plant height (45.1 cm), number of branches plant^-1 (18.5), number of flower heads plant^-1 (87.9), seed yield plant^-1 (531.8 mg), 1000 seed weight (110 mg), resultant seed germination (64%) and vigour index (168).

 

Key words: Age of seedling for transplanting, Davana, dry matter, germination, herbage yield, seed yield, vigour.