Growth and Yield of Dragon Fruit in Aonla based Multistoried Fruit Production Model

Abstract

The study was conducted at the aonla based agroforestry experimental field of the department of Agroforestry and Environment, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman Agricultural University from June, 2019 to July, 2020 to develop a multistoried food production model for the terrace ecosystem of Bangladesh. The experiment was carried out under twenty years old aonla orchard which was considered as upper storied component, while two minor fruits namely carambola and lemon were used as middle storied component. Dragon fruit was the test crop grown in the alley of tree lines. The experiment was laid out in a two-factor randomized complete block design with three replications. Three different production systems (T1: aonla + carambola + lemon + dragon fruit, T2: aonla + dragon fruit, and T3: dragon fruit as sole) were considered as the three different levels of factor A. Two dragon fruit genotypes i.e. red fleshed dragon fruit (V1), and white fleshed dragon fruit (V2) were considered as the two levels of factor B. Red fleshed genotype produced the highest plant height, maximum number of branches and fruit yield compared to those of white fleshed genotype irrespective of treatment combinations. Total height increment, mean annual increment and current annual increment of plant height were found maximum in red fleshed genotype in multistoried conditions. A negative linear relationship was observed between plant height and Photosynthetically Active Radiation (PAR) but a positive linear relationship was noticed between the yield of dragon fruit and PAR. The highest Land Equivalent Ratio was observed in aonla + carambola + lemon + dragon fruit with white fleshed genotype. The result revealed that red fleshed dragon fruit genotype was found suitable for partial shade conditions like aonla tree and successfully grown without scarifying the significant yield loss compared to that of the open field.