Morphology of Panicum genotypes submitted to periods of cessation of irrigation

Abstract

This study aimed to evaluate the morphological characteristics of Panicum maximum clones during the regrowth period following cessation of irrigation. Panicum clones were collected in Sergipe and in three Pernambuco locations (‘Sao Bento do Una’, ‘Itambe’ and ‘Sao Joao da Coroa Grande’), in addition to ‘Mombaca’, ‘Tanzânia’ and ‘Massai’ cultivars. The treatments consisted of seven clones, which were subjected to either 7, 14, 21 or 28 days of water suspension. The experimental design was completely randomized in a factorial 7 × 4 design, with four replicates. The morphological characteristics evaluated included the number of tillers, plant height, leaf blade length, number of green leaves per tiller and number of dead leaves per tiller. The clone factor significantly affected the number of tillers per pot and the number of dead leaves per tiller (P ≤ 0.05). The clone from Sergipe produced a greater number of tillers (8.39) than the other clones following 28 days of water suspension, while the ‘Mombaca’ cultivar had a greater number of dead leaves (5.39) after 7 days of water suspension. In general, the 28-day cessation of irrigation period resulted in taller plants with larger leaf blades and a greater number of green leaves per tiller.