Seasonality in Cocoa: Weather Influence on Pod Characters of Cocoa Clones

Cocoa (Theobroma cacao L.) is the only source of chocolate and worldwide number of people depends upon cocoa for their lively hood. Now the crop is spreading to non-traditional area and it is very much necessary to study the impact of environment of crop production. The present study included seven released selections from Kerala Agricultural University and observations were taken for three years 2012, 13 and 14. From performance analysis CCRP IV and CCRP VI were found to be the best varieties with big pods (440.887 g and 419.0 g, respectively) and high wet bean weight (110.02 g and 107.95 g, respectively). Increase in morning humidity resulted in small pods. Wet bean weight showed a negative correlation with temperature and positive correlation with rainfall and number of rainy days. Almost all varieties showed maximum potential during post monsoon season. Increase in pod and bean characters during post monsoon period can be attributed to favourable condition prevailed during monsoon.