Spices and Condiments (1+1)

Pests and diseases

Pests
Rodents (rats and moles) cause heavy damage to the crop by eating away the developing corms. As a control measure, the burrows should be fumigated with Phostaxin or Phosphene or poison-baited using Zinc phosphide and the treated cereal grains should be placed in the freshly-opened burrows.

Diseases
Corm-rot is an important disease of saffron. To protect the corms from rotting, they are treated with 5% solution of Copper sulphate or any other copper fungicide before planting.