مجله علوم و فنون باغبانی ایران
سال سیزدهم شماره 3 (پاییز 1391)

According to alternate bearing of pistachio trees, changes of nutrient concentrations in leaves and shoots of pistachio trees in a completely randomized block design with equal sampling experiment by 3 replications and equal sampling (9 samples in each plat) and 3 treatments of time was carried out. At first, according to the results of soil testing, N, P and K nutrients were added in all treatments. At the first year (on-year), results showed that P concentration decreased in leaves and shoots. However, K concentration increased in the leaves. Also, 10 (first time) to 32 (second time) days after flowering, Na concentration in leaves and shoots diminished 33 and 50% respectively but it increased significantly until August. Ca and Mg concentration in leaf and shoot increased during the growth period. Zn Concentration’s change in leaf and shoots was completely descending. Concentration of copper in leaf increased from 22.1 to 25/5 (mg kg-1) but then it decreased. In the second year (off-year), concentration of P in leaf and shoot same as the first year decreased but, concentration of this element was less than fruiting year at 3 times sampling. Also, leaf and shoot K concentration decreased. Na and Mg concentrations in leaf and shoots were same as the 1st year. Against of the 1st year, amount of calcium decreased. Zinc and copper concentrations increased. As a conclusion, alternative bearing will affect leaf and shoots nutrients content of pistachio trees. That may be, one of the effective factors of alternative bearing is changing in nutrient concentration.

In order to study of genetic diversity among male and female pistachio genotypes, 30 male pistachio trees and 8 female pistachio trees from Iranian Pistachio Research Institute (IPRI) in 2009 year located in Rafsanjan were used for data recording. Fifteen morphological characters (4 qualitative and 11 quantitative) were evaluated based on IPGRI descriptor. Pollen germination percentage in artificial media was varied from 56.25 % in MK3 to 96.4 % in MS20. Results from simple correlation analysis showed that flower bud fresh weight, flower bud length and width correlated positively with leaf length, width and terminal leaflet length and also length and width terminal leaflet correlated negatively with number of leaflet. Factor analysis was used to determine the effective characters and the main factors. Five factors with coefficient higher than 0.60 were defined that contributed to 81.45% of total variance, and characters with the highest factor loading were considered as significant. Flower bud characteristics were consisted 23.93 of total variance. Pistachio genotypes were clustered based on five factors and at similarity distance of 20, they were divided into four main-clusters. The results of present study showed that there was high genetic diversity between studied male genotypes morphological characteristics were useful for identification of pistachio genotypes and determine of genetic diversity.

Olive is a subtropical fruit tree species that has an important role in employment and economy of olive growing countries including Iran. The precise identification of olive genotypes is a crucial step forward for developing of olive production industry. In this study we used 26 qualitative features proposed by International Olive Council (IOC), for identification and analysis of genetic variation among 57 olive genotypes and cultivars from six different geographical origins. The result of discriminant analysis confirmed the primary grouping based on geographical origin. Based on cluster analysis, all unknown genotypes used in this study, showed a high similarity to those cultivars from Spain and Syria. The result of variance analysis of individuals showed that genetic variation within groups is larger than genetic variation among groups. As a conclusion, morphological features proposed by IOC can serve as efficient and reproducible morphological markers for identification of olive cultivars. Moreover, Iranian domestic cultivars are morphologically distinct and have probably different genetic backgrounds than those from other countries and therefore are valuable materials for olive breeding programs.

This experiment was performed to evaluate the effects of different level of vermicompost alone or plus chemical fertilizer on morphological parameters and some nutrient concentration in basil during 2005-2009. Experiment was arranged in split plot based on randomized complete block design. Treatments were fertilizers at six levels including control, recommended chemical fertilizer or CF (urea, potassium sulphate and triple superphosphateby 70, 60 and 50 kg.ha-1, respectively), 20 and 40 ton.ha-1 of vermicompost either alone or plus half of CF and sub plots consisting of application period including: one, two, three and four years. Results showed that significant interactions were exist between two factors in terms of plant height, canopy diameter, dry matter yield and some macronutrient concentrations (N, P and K). Increasing in both vermicompost amount and application periods markedly improved mentioned parameters. Maximum canopy diameter, P and K concentrations were recorded when 40 ton-ha-1 vermicompost plus ½ CF applied for three successive years. Orthogonal comparison revealed that vermicompost increased leaf P and K concentrations more than chemical fertilizer alone. In contrast, chemical fertilizer was superior in terms of plant height. Simoltaneously application of vermicompost and chemical fertilizers in comparison with vermicompost alone increased all of characteristics except plants height and leaf N content.

Effects of seaweed extract Algaren® foliar spray at four levels (0, 0.2, 0.6 and 1 mlL-1) on growth; yield and quality of cherry tomatoes grown in greenhouse conditions were studied. Vegetative and generative characteristics including plant height, fruit set percent and fruit mean weight; as well as fruit quality including fruit firmness, vitamin C content, total soluble solids and titratable acidity were significantly affected by treatments. In contrast, the differences between leaf chlorop0hyll content, node numbers to the first truss and number of flowers in each truss under different levels of seaweed extract were not significantly affected. According to the results, foliar application of seaweed extract at the concentrations of 0.2 and 0.6 mlL-1 were recommended for higher yield and improved fruit quality, respectively.

In spite of attractive appearance, delicious flavour and high antioxidant capacity of strawberry fruit, it has short postharvest life. In this study the effect of fruit dipping in putrescine and spermidine (1 and 2 mM) on postharvest quality and maintenance of strawberry fruit cv. ‘Selva’ was studied. During 10 days storage at 4◦ C, changes of quality attributes including texture firmness, weight loss percentage, surface color, vitamin C content, flesh anthocyanin, total phenolics, antioxidant capacity, titratable acidity, soluble solids content and juice pH were determined at two days intervals. Treatment with putrescine lowered the changes in surface color and fruit weight loss and retarded the fruit softening. Also putrescine and spermidine treated fruits showed higher anthocyanin and antioxidant capacity and lower vitamin C than control fruits. During the storage period of control fruits, titratable acidity showed reducing pattern when pH and soluble solids content increased gradually. While the use of putrescine and spermidine significantly retarded changes of pH and soluble solid concentration.

In recent years, global warming and the scarcity of water have led to the use of other sources of irrigation water, such as low-quality saline and recyceled waste waters. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effects of three irrigation water qualities (regular, waste, and saline well waters with EC of 0.3, 1.0 and 4.8 dS/m, respectively) and the growing media (soil and soil +10% v/v perlite) on characteristics of three marigold cultivars (Tagetes erecta L. ‘Climax’ and ‘Antigua’ and T. patula L. ‘Sophia’), in a pot experiment. All of the vegetative traits, except growth period and plant height had no significant differences in waste and saline water treatments. Irrigation with saline water significantly reduced all of the vegetative traits. Flowering priods in regular, waste, and saline water treatments were 76, 63, and 46 days, respectively. The highest and lowest values for the main flower duration, diameter and weight and the number of flowers per plant were observed in regular and saline water treatments, respectively. Flower yield per plant in waste and regular water treatments were statistically similar, but reduced in saline water by 35 and 39 %, respectively. Addition of perlite to soil, increased growth period and all of the vegetative and reproductive traits. Plant height and canopy shading area were the most different characters among the cultivars. Flowering period and all of the flower related traits of ‘Antigua’ were statistically more than ‘Climax’, but the values were close and except for number of flower per plant, were greatly reduced in ‘Sophia’. Compare to ‘Climax’ and ‘Antigua’ cultivars, ‘Sophia’ showed 61 and 68 % lower flower weight per plant.

Optimum nutrition is one of the most important factors that affecting quantity and quality of medicinal plants. Therefore, 4 formulation with different electrical conductivity (EC= 0.7, 1.4, 2.8 and 5.6 dSm-1) were investigated on vegetative characteristics, concentration and components of essential oil of lemon verbena in a soilless culture system. Based on our results, leaf fresh weight was affected by nutrition elements (p<0.05); so that the maximum and minimum fresh weight was observed at 1.4 and 5.6 dSm-1, respectively. With increasing in EC (more than 1.4 dSm-1) stomatal conductance and consequently net photosynthesis declined. Probably, decrease in fresh weight in response to high level of EC, resulted by decreasing in stomatal conductance and consequently decreasing in net photosynthesis. Essential oil content in lemon verbena increased synchronously with increasing in nutrition elements (p<0. 5); so that with an increasing in EC level from 1.4 to 2.8 dSm-1 and from 2.8 to 5.6 dSm-1, 37 and 45% of essential oil was increased, respectively. Geranial, neral and Alpha-curcumene were the main components of essential oil, and geranial was influenced by different formulation more than other components. These results led to conclution that optimum concentration of nutrient element has a key role on physiological factors, such as stomatal conductance, net photosynthesis, chlorophyll, proline, concentration and components of essential oil.

Abortion of embryoes in stenospermocarpic grapes limits the efficiency of breeding of seedless cultivars. Plant growth regulators are one of the important factors to promote embryo germination in stenospermic grapes. Cycocel is growth inhibitor which reduces sitmulative effects of gibberellic acid and improve embryo rescue. The present study was carried out in 2010, to investigate the effects of cycocel on grapevines in field condition, on ovule development and subsequent embryo rescue of two stenospermocarpic grape cultivars (‘Askary’ and ‘Bidanh Safid’). Concentrations of cycocel were 0, 200 and 500 ppm. Length of berries and ovules were measured in ‘Bidaneh Safid’ and ‘Askary’, after 20 days and 40 days of flower opening, respectively. Ovules were dissected out from berries were cultured in Nitsch & Nitsch medium containing 1μM GA3,1μM NAA, 2 gL-1 activated charcoal, 20 gL-1 sucrose and 8 gL-1 agar. A factorial experiment based on completely randomized design with five replications was used. Measured characteristics were length of berries and ovules, percentage of browned, callused and germinated ovules. Results showed that, length of berries and ovules, and also percentage of germinated ovules in ‘Askary’ cultivar was higher than ‘Bidaneh Safid’ cultivar. The results also showed that effects of of cycocel were significant on length of berries and ovules, and also on percentage of callused and germinated ovules at 1% level, but were not significant on percentage of browned ovules. Application of cycocel at 200 mgl-1 significantly increased length of berries and ovules, percentage of callused and germinated ovules. Application of 200 mgl-1 cycocel also resulted in germination of 28.8% ovules in ‘Askary’ cultivar.

To investigate the effect of polyethylene mulches and irrigation intervals on the qualitative and quantitative characteristics of melon (Cucumis melo var. Inodorus), a split plot experiment based on randomized complete block design with four replications was carried out in Ardestan region in Isfahan Province at 2004. Main plot were consisted of irrigation intervals (6, 9, and 12 day) and sub plots were three mulch covers (transparent, black polyethylene mulches, and bare soil). Results showed that all measured characteristics, except length and fresh weight of plants, were significantly affected by irrigation intervals and soil covers in second stage of measuring (120 days after planting). In mulched plots, yield was decreased when irrigation interval was increased. Mulching caused early germination, increased vegetative growth and yield of the crops. The highest yield (29.66 t ha-1) was obtained in transparent mulch and 6-day irrigation interval regime.