Tomato seedling production through rooted cuttings in hydroponic

Abstract

The objective of this work was to develop a method to produce tomato seedlings through rooted cuttings in hydroponic. Three experiments were carried out and in the experiments 1 and 2, the cuttings were rooted in fenolic foam and in nutritive solution, respectively. The treatments represented the cut positions of the cuttings in the axil of leaves 1 to 5, from the base to the apex. In the experiment 3, cuttings rooted in the experiments 1 and 2 were transplanted to vases containing nutritive solution and cultivated until the production of a single truss. The root fresh matter, root intersection, stem dry matter, leaf dry matter, root length, leaf area, leaf number and stem diameter, in the experiments 1 and 2, showed no significant differences between the treatments 1, 2, 3 and 4. In the experiment 3, fruit diameter presented significant difference between the treatments. Treatment 3 was superior to treatment 5, and the treatments 1, 2, 3 and 4 were similar. In hydroponic, it is possible to produce tomato seedlings through cuttings rooted in fenolic foam or nutritive solution.