Influence of variety and hornwort extract on growth and yield of tomato plant

Abstract

An experimental trial was conducted at Al-Haidariya district, Najaf governorate, Iraq, for the spring season of 2019-2020. The experiment included two factors. The first factor included three cultivars of the tomato plant Solanum lycopersicum (Jawahiri, Al-Ibrahimi and Al-Asili). The second factor included spraying three concentrations of Ceratophyllum demersum (hornwort) extract, which are (0,5,10) ml -l , on vegetative growth. Randomized complete block design (R. C. B. D.) was used as a factorial experiment in a split-plot design with three replicates for each treatment. Duncan's multiple range test was adopted to compare the mean with a probability of 0.05% level of significance. The results appear of the variety on the vegetative growth indicators, as the Al-Asili variety outperformed in increasing the plant height, the number of plant leaves, the number of main branches, leaf area, dry weight, chlorophyll percentage, and the amount of yield, which amounted to 54.43cm, 97.63 leaves. plant-1 and 6.66 branches. plant-1 , and it reached 73.86 cm2 . and 125 % for dry weight percentage, while the total chlorophyll content was 1.23 mg.gm-1 and 10.1Km, compared to the Al-Jawhari cultivar, which had the least effect on plant height on reaching 37.43cm, 68.76 leaves. plant-1, and the number of papers was 62.06 cm2 . Leaf -1 , while the dry weight decreased and the chlorophyll the variety Al-Ibrahimi 83.33 g and 1.04 mg.gm-1 . Spraying at a concentration of 10 ml.l-1 increased the vegetative growth characteristics significantly, as the plant height reached 54.46 cm and the number of leaves was 100.76. Plant - 1 , and the number of branches is 6.3 branches. Plant-1 leaf area amounted to 73.53 cm2 , the dry weight of the shoot was 133.33%, and the percentage of total chlorophyll was 1.22 mg.gm-1 Keywords: Ceratophyllum demersum, hornwort, Solanum lycopersicum, vegetative parameters