Response of Arabica Coffee Cultivars to Competition from Beggarticks

Abstract

The goal of this study was to analyze the response of Arabica coffee cultivars grown under three levels of Bidens pilosa (beggarticks) interference. At 30 days after transplanting (DAT) of 14 Arabica coffee cultivars into 11 L pots, beggarticks was seeded in the pots and soon after emergence, three levels of weed infestation were established: none, low (two plants per pot), and high (five plants per pot). Treatments were arranged in a 14 × 3 factorial scheme under a completely randomized design, with four replicates. Coffee plant growth was evaluated at both weed emergence and blossoming (90 DAT) when the experiment was completed. Regardless beggarticks infestation levels, significant effects of cultivars occurred on almost all the coffee growth variables. Specifically, the Arabica coffee cultivars Arara, Asa Branca, and Bourbon Amarelo exhibited greater values for root, leaf, shoot, and whole plant dry matter when compared with the other cultivars. The Arabica coffee cultivars presented lower leaf area increments, and also lower leaf, shoot, and whole plant dry matter accumulation when grown under either low or high infestation levels (between which there were no statistical differences, p>0.05) in comparison with that under the weed-free treatment. However, there were no significant interactions between Arabica coffee cultivars and weed infestation levels for those crop growth variables. We conclude that all Arabica coffee cultivars tested were equally susceptible to B. pilosa competition in this phase of crop implantation.

Intercropped Soybean Plant Population in a Coffee Plantation and Its Effects on Agronomic Parameters and Geospatial Information

“…Coffee trees respond differently to the interference of other plants. They can present decreased leaf area, low growth rate, lower productivity, smaller crown volume, and color pattern changes due to reduced water or nutrients [21][22][23]. Remote sensing and geoprocessing are accurate tools for qualitative and quantitative assessment of agricultural crops.…”

Growth of robusta coffee after the application of herbicides to control Urochloa ruziziensis

“…It is worth noting that the majority of the coffee plant root system is concentrated in the soil close to the stem and goes down to 0.30 m deep (Ronchi et al, 2015). Thus, weed management of newly planted crops to reduce inter-species competition is an extremely important activity in the coffee production system (Borges et al, 2019).…”