Growth responses of two varieties of Heliconia flowers to selected growth media in Port Harcourt, South-South Nigeria

Abstract

Lack of suitable variety as well as appropriate growth medium constitutes major problems to flower production. It is against this backdrop that a pot experiment was carried out in the Department of Crop and Soil Science Demonstration Plot, Faculty of Agriculture, University of Port Harcourt, Nigeria between April and May, 2013 to determine the growth responses of two varieties of Heliconia flowers to selected growth media. The experiment comprised of two Heliconia varieties (Jade and Golden Torch) and six (6) growth media namely, topsoil (control), river sand, coconut husk, topsoil + river sand (), topsoil + coconut husk () and river sand + coconut husk (). The experiment was in a 2×6 factorial arrangement fitted into a completely randomized design replicated thrice. Results showed that topsoil + coconut husk () performed best at 4WAP by producing the highest stem height (8.7 cm), stem girth (2.9 cm) number of leaves (3.3), leaf area (41.5 cm 2 ) and longest root length (14.5) and more roots number (4.1) and this was followed by river sandcoconut husk (11) while the sole river sand gave the lowest vegetative traits. There was no significant difference on the vegetative parameters of the two varieties of Heliconia flowers and also on interaction. According to this experiment, topsoil + coconut husk () growth media is the better one for the growth of these Heliconia two varieties of flowers in the area of study. However, it needs more study on soil to recommend for farmers and the continual use of top soil as a candidate growth medium need to be discouraged because it is non-renewable hence, in the absence of top soil, river sand in combination with coconut husk () could serve as next available alternative.

Effect of growing media on rooting response of tomato (Lycopersicum esculentum L.) stem cuttings

“…Similarly maximum leaf area (2.62 cm 2 ) was noticed in Sahil hybrid which was statistically at par with Salar hybrid having leaf area (2.59 cm 2 ), while minimum leaf area (2.32 cm 2 ) and (2.31 cm 2 ) were found in Sandal and Anna, respectively (Fıgure 1). Leaf area of the plant depends upon the availability of the nutrients as reported by [23]. Their results revealed that high leaf area in top soil + peat moss (1:1) media might be due to the ability of the plant to retain nutrients and water for translocation to shoot system.…”

Aloe vera and STS solution on microbial population and vase life of Heliconia cut flowers

“…Heliconia (Golden torch) is one of the beautiful and popular cut flowers in Nigeria. Many species of the plant are found in the tropics (Albuquerque et al, 2014, Omovbude et al, 2016. In addition to their exotic beauty, they also have a natural postharvest vase life of 6-8 days after which senescence occurs resulting in rapid wilting of the petals.…”

Growth Response of Two Varieties Chrysanthemum (Chrysanthemum sp.) On Some Media Composition

“…Top soil is commonly used as a growing medium. Rojas et al [5] report that the emergence across the five plant species was higher in the topsoil growth media compared to the other soil materials, most likely due to its larger available water content as a consequence of increased amounts of organic C. Top soils are generally unsatisfactory for the production of plants in containers because the soils do not provide the aeration, drainage, and water holding capacity required for plant growth [6].…”

“…Sand provides excellent support and gas exchange but has insufficient water and nutrient supplying capacity. Since water is held on the surfaces of particles, sand has a small water reserve [6].…”