Growing Pigeonpea (Tur/Arhar) in Andhra Pradesh

Updated 2026-07-13 · Region guide

Andhra Pradesh sits in the East Coast Plains & Hills with hot, humid coastal + delta and deltaic alluvium, black + red soils. Fertile Godavari–Krishna deltas make it a leading rice bowl. Here's how pigeonpea (tur/arhar) — a Kharif crop — fits, and how to grow it well here.

Is Andhra Pradesh good for growing pigeonpea (tur/arhar)?

When to sow pigeonpea (tur/arhar) in Andhra Pradesh

Sow in Jun–Jul and harvest around Dec–Jan. The crop takes about 150–270 days. In Andhra Pradesh's hot, humid coastal + delta, the window matters more than anything else you do: ~900 mm rainfall and Godavari/Krishna delta canals mean a late Kharif sowing runs pigeonpea (tur/arhar) into the wrong weather at its most sensitive stage.

Where pigeonpea (tur/arhar) actually grows in Andhra Pradesh

AP's redgram is a Rayalaseema crop — Kurnool, Nandyal, Anantapur, Sri Sathya Sai, Kadapa and Annamayya — on red sandy loam and shallow black soil, with a coastal-Andhra presence in Prakasam, Palnadu, Guntur and Bapatla. In Anantapur and Kurnool most of it is not a sole crop at all: it goes in as the intercrop line inside groundnut, and in the Guntur-Prakasam tract alongside cotton.

Where it is sold: Kurnool, Nandyal, Adoni, Dhone, Kadapa, Anantapur and Guntur are the yards. The practical channel in AP is the village Rythu Bharosa Kendra rather than the mandi gate — certified seed goes out through the RBK and MSP procurement registration happens there, with AP MARKFED doing the buying. Worth knowing: in a broken-monsoon year those same yards are handling a redgram crop that is the only thing left standing, which is exactly when the national price is being set by imports rather than by your scarcity.

The local risk to plan for: Rayalaseema is among the driest tracts in India that still grows a pulse, and here redgram is not really a crop in its own right — it is the insurance line inside the groundnut that survives when the groundnut fails. That means it gets planted for security, then starved of attention, and a mid-season dry spell drops the flowers outright.

Best pigeonpea (tur/arhar) varieties for Andhra Pradesh

Grown in Andhra Pradesh:

• LRG-41 and LRG-52 — the Lam/Guntur ANGRAU redgram series bred for AP
• LRG-105 — a newer Lam release
• Asha (ICPL-87119) — for the long-duration rainfed Rayalaseema crop
• ICPL-85063 (Lakshmi) — where an earlier crop suits the intercrop rotation

Confirm the variety is notified for Andhra Pradesh — on deltaic alluvium, black + red soils under Godavari/Krishna delta canals, a variety bred for a different zone will underperform whatever the seed packet claims. Your Andhra Pradesh KVK or agriculture officer holds the current shortlist.

Typical yield & price

Typical yield here is around 4–7 quintal/acre. The government MSP is ₹7,000/quintal; local mandi rates vary, so check YieldAI for today's live Andhra Pradesh price.

Common problems in Andhra Pradesh

The pests and diseases to scout for:

• pod borer at flowering, heaviest in the Guntur-Prakasam tract where redgram sits beside cotton and inherits its pest load
• fusarium wilt on the older redgram land of Kurnool and Nandyal
• sterility mosaic, showing up as bushy non-podding plants in patches
• a mid-season Rayalaseema dry spell that sheds flowers wholesale — the damage looks like pest damage and gets sprayed for, wrongly

hot conditions shape which of these bite hardest each season — scout early and act while a problem is small. YieldAI can identify a pest or disease from a photo of your crop.

Key practices

• In Anantapur and Kurnool, treat the redgram line as your insurance, not a side crop — it is what stands when the groundnut fails in a broken monsoon, so give it the row spacing it needs instead of squeezing it to fit more groundnut
• Use the Lam (LRG) series bred at Guntur for AP conditions rather than material bred for the Marathwada black soils
• Start at your village RBK, not the mandi gate — certified seed goes out through it and MSP registration happens there
• Sow with the first proper monsoon rain in June-July; Rayalaseema redgram has to flower before the rain leaves, and a late sowing never catches up