The present study was undertaken to conduct performance evaluation of manually operated weeders. The six weeders selected for the study were one wheel multi pronged weeder, one wheel straight pronged weeder, one wheel curve pronged weeder, two wheel multi pronged weeder, two wheel straight pronged weeder, two wheel curve pronged weeder. Besides the six weeders the conventional hand weeding with local made kurpi was also considered as one of the methods of weeding. Women aged between 13 to 52 years were employed for this study. The Performance evaluation was done by taking into consideration the field capacity, plant damage percent, weeding index percent and human energy required to operate the weeder. There was highly significant mean difference in the field capacity of weeders (P=<.0001). The study revealed that the one wheel straight pronged weeder was superior to all the other weeders with reference to field capacity. Highly significant mean difference was found between one wheel straight pronged weeder and rest of the weeders. In case of plant damage mean difference among weeders was found significant. The mean plant damage percent was low in case of traditional hand weeding followed by one wheel straight pronged weeder and one wheel curve pronged weeder. There was no significant mean difference among weeders with reference to weeding index percent. The mean weeding index per cent was highest for conventional hand weeding, followed by two wheel straight pronged weeder, one wheel multi pronged weeder and one wheel straight pronged weeder. The difference in the mean energy spent by the subjects while performing conventional method of weeding against mean energy spent by the subjects when weeding was done with the rest of the weeders selected in the study was found significant. Other than that there was no significant mean difference in energy expenditure while using any other weeders was found. Mean energy expenditure was less in case of traditional hand weeding. Among the weeders mean energy expenditure was less in case of two wheel straight pronged weeder. There was a significant mean difference in the performance index of the weeders (P= <.0001). The mean difference in performance index between one wheel straight pronged weeder and all the other weeders together with traditional hand weeding was highly significant. The performance index score was maximum for one wheel straight pronged weeder and minimum for traditional hand weeding. Overall performance was high for one wheel straight pronged weeder followed by two wheel straight pronged weeder and straight pronged weeder.

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