Effect of silicon on yield and fruit quality of tomato grown under sandy soil conditions

Abstract

An experiment was carried out in a greenhouse in Ismailia Agricultural Research Station in 2019/2020 to investigate the impact of salicylic acid (SA)spraying leaves as a silicon source on the growth, yield, and fruit quality of two tomatoes cultivars (Wadistar and Alissa). The design of the experiment was split plots in two factors with three replications. The first factor was two different tomato cultivars, Wadistar and Alissa. The other factor was spraying with SA at (0, 50, 100, 150 mg/ liter) as a source of silicon three times every 15 days, the first spraying after 15 days after transplanting, the chemicals are applied in the early morning using a spray. Duncan's test was applied to compare the means at 5% probability. Foliar spraying with SA at all levels significantly increased growth, yield, and quality parameters compared to the control. All morphological features (including plant height, leaves and branches numbers, leaf area, fresh and dry weight stems, fresh and dry weight leaves) and the content of chlorophyll pigments in leaves improved with an increase in salicylic acid concentration up to 100 mg/ liter. The productivity and quality characteristics of tomato fruits, notably firmness, improved. When the salicylic acid content was raised to 150 mg/liter, all of these characteristics decreased. Finally, the application of 100 mg of SA/liter increased tomatoes productivity and fruit quality. Keywords : Tomato, Salicylic acid, Silicon, Sandy soil, Yield, Fruit firmness DOI : 10.7176/JBAH/12-8-01 Publication date : April 30th 2022