International Journal of Horticultural Science and Technology
Volume:5 Issue: 1, Winter - Spring 2018

Production of Mrenda (Corchorus olitorius) in Kenya has been low due to various reasons, such as poor agronomic practices like incorrect fertilizer rates. Observations from the Mrenda growing areas showed that there is high unmet demand for crop in local market and even for export. This is due to yields being low, 2-4 tons/ha as compared to expected yield of 5-8 tons/ha. Therefore, the main objective of this study was to discern effect of Nitrogen fertilizer on growth and yield of Mrenda (Corchorus olitorius) morphotypes. Seed samples were planted at two sites of University of Eldoret and Kenya Agriculture and Livestock Research Organization, Kitale using Randomly Complete Block Design with three replicates and three levels of nitrate (Calcium nitrate) fertilizer. Five plants were tagged and the following traits were recorded: plant height, number of branching at main stem, number of pods and fresh leaf yield. Results showed highest N fertilizer rates had most effect exhibited by Morphotypes GT and BT on plants height; plant branching; pods number per plant and yield weight per plant respectively. Use of no N fertilizer caused lowest plant height, branching at main stem, pods and leaf weight per plant by Morphotypes GT and BT. It is concluded that Mrenda is N loving plant as it enhanced its growth when high amount of Nitrogen fertilizer was applied. It is recommended farmers use high N fertilizer for Mrenda production.

Frequency of irrigation to the crops is the key factor for proper growth and economic yield. Therefore, in the current study growth of broccoli plants was investigated under different irrigation levels in pot culture condition. Five levels of irrigation schedules were applied including I0 [Non-irrigation control], I1 [Irrigation up to 15 days after transplanting (DAT)], I2 [Irrigation up to 30 DAT], I3 [Irrigation up to 45 DAT] and I4 [Irrigation up to 60 DAT] with three replications. Maximum plant height, shortest days to curd initiation, fresh mass of curd, curd diameter, shoot fresh mass and moisture content of roots per plant were obtained from irrigation up to 60 DAT. Moreover, maximum number of leaves, leaf fresh mass, moisture content, root length, root fresh and dry mass per plant were obtained from irrigation up to 45 DAT while the lowest results were obtained from non-irrigated control treatment. Higher dry weight (3.37 g plant-1) and dry matter content of leaves (11.76%) and roots (18.94%) and root to shoot ratio (0.077) were observed from non-irrigated control treatment. Results suggested that irrigation up to 60 DAT might be optimum schedule for broccoli, but in terms of economic profitability, irrigation up to 45 DAT would be sufficient.

Understanding mechanisms of salt tolerance, physiological responses to salt stress, and screening genotypes for breeding programs are important scientific issues remained to be investigated in pistachio. Therefore, current study was carried out to investigate response of different pistachio cultivars (G1, G2, Kaleghochi and UCB1) to salinity treatments (0.6 as control, 10, 20 dS m-1 using saline underground water) as a factorial experiment based on randomized complete block design with three replications in greenhouse of Iranian Pistachio Research Institute (Rafsanjan) in 2014-2015. Some physiological and nutrition properties of the pistachio cultivars measured in this study. Results showed decreased stomatal conductance, photosynthesis rate, chlorophyll content, and Fv/Fm in response to salinity treatments. The main cause of these changes was related to the altered ion contents along with the competition among ions for being absorbed by plant. Despite of sufficient amount of potassium in the soil, high concentrations of sodium and other associated elements such as calcium and magnesium decreased the ability of pistachio plants to absorb adequate amount of vital ions such as potassium. As a result of sodium accumulation and deficiency of potassium, K+/Na+ ratio was decreased in pistachio leaves. Consequently, toxicity of sodium ions in the plant cells reduced stomatal conductance and the rate of photosynthesis. Comparison between cultivars showed that for the most of the traits the difference between control and moderate salinity (10 ds m-1) in all cultivars was not significant. However, G2 cultivar showed higher ability to accumulate potassium and absorbed lower concentration of sodium, calcium, and magnesium under sever salinity treatment (20 ds m-1). These result suggested that G2 could be considered as a potential tolerant cultivar for cultivation in saline area.

Apple is one of the most important fruits in temperate zones with a long post-harvest life during cold storage. A factorial experiment, in a randomized completely block design was used to investigate the preharvest application of Iron (0, 500 and 1000 mg Fe-EDDHA per tree) and nitrogen (0, 48 and 96 g ammonium nitrate per tree( on some postharvest qualitative characteristics in "Red spur" and "Granny smith" apple cultivars. Iron and nitrogen treatments in all 72 trees were applied in three stages (full bloom, 30 and 60 days after full bloom). Fruit quality parameters including colorskin color parameters (L*, a*, b*), flesh firmness, total soluble solids (TSS), Titratable acidity (TA), flavor index (TSS/TA) and total antioxidant activity were measured. According to the results, a decrease in fruit firmness, TA and increase in TSS/TA in both cultivars were observed during cold storage irrespective of treatments. The results showed that in “Red spur” cultivar, Fe application decreased fruit firmness, TSS, b* parameter values and increased TSS/TA, a* parameter values, while, N application increased TSS. Fruit firmness was decreased and TSS, TSS/TA, b* parameter values were increased by Fe application in “Granny smith” cultivar. Fruit firmness, TSS and L* parameter values were decreased and TA was increased by N application on this cultivar. In conclusion, Fe and N application in proper levels improved some postharvest qualitative characteristics in "Red spur" and "Granny smith" apple cultivars during cold storage.

Nano-fertilizers can increase value of products in agriculture. Iron plays many important and essential roles in plant growth and development as compared to other micronutrients. In the present study, effects of different levels of enriched nano chelated Iron fertilizer (25, 50, 100, and 200 mg l-1) were investigated in comparison with the common Iron (FeSO4.7H2O) on in vitro proliferation of apple explants cultivar 'Gala' in the MS medium. The results showed that enrichednano chelated Iron increased growth and proliferation of apple in terms of number of nodes, shoots, and leaves, nodes and shoots length, leaf area, fresh and dry weights of shoot and chlorophyll index. The maximum growth and proliferation was observed at 100 mg l-1 of enrichednano chelated Iron, while in higher concentration (200 mg l-1), the growth was decreased due to the Iron toxicity. According to the obtained results, 100 mg l-1 of enrichednano chelated Iron can be added for increasing growth on in vitro proliferation of 'Gala' apple cultivar. The present study is the first report of the effects of enrichednano chelated Iron fertilizer on growth and in vitro proliferation of apple that can be useful for in vitro culture of the plant.
of enriched nano iron chelated can be added for increasing growth on in vitro proliferation of 'Gala' apple cultivar. The present study is the first report of the effects of enriched nano chelated iron fertilizer on growth and in vitro proliferation in apple that can be useful for
in vitro culture of the plant.

Drought as the most important abiotic stress has deleterious effects on plants. Developing drought tolerant varieties can help produce plants in a sustainable way. This study was conducted to identify drought tolerant and drought sensitive thyme species including Thymus vulgaris, T. vulgaris (origin: Spain), T. carmanicus, T. daenensis and T. kotschyanus and to study the mechanism used by them to cope with drought stress. For this purpose, relative water content, water use efficiency, soil water depilation rate, root:shoot ratio, drought resistance index and a new criterion "FC ceased growth" were used. T. carmanicus and T. daenensis had the lowest and the highest reduction on relative water content, respectively. In terms of water use efficiency and soil water depletion curve, the highest and the lowest values were detected for T. daenensis and T. carmanicus, respectively. The most and the least root:shoot ratios were recorded for T. daenensis and T. vulgaris (origin: Spain), respectively. Analyses by drought resistance index and PCA revealed that T. carmanicus is drought susceptible, T. kotschyanus and T. vulgaris are semi-drought susceptible, and T. daenensis and T. vulgaris (origin: Spain) are semi-drought tolerant species. FC ceased growth analysis showed that T. carmanicus stopped its growth at higher FC, while T. kotschyanus stopped it at lower FC. Therefore, based on this criterion and considering the sustainability of growth under drought condition, T. carmanicus and T. kotschyanus are the least and the most drought tolerant Thymus species.

To produce new, high-quality offsprings, we generated two cross combinations in Iris germanica. Three parental plants were selected after preliminary screening of commercial traits in different cultivars. Fourteen quantitative traits mostly related to the flower organ were investigated on 15 progenies and three parental plants in a randomized complete block design with three replications. Significant positive and negative correlations were observed among different studied attributes at 0.01 and 0.05 probability. The highest positive (+0.86) and negative (-0.76) correlations was recorded between diameter of flowering branch with crown diameter as well as peduncle length, respectively. Cluster analysis using Ward’s method separated most of the progenies from the parental plants based on evaluated morphological characteristics. However, some of the progenies were grouped with their maternal parent. In PCA analysis, five factors explained 87.84% of the total variations; crown diameters as well as diameter of flowering branch were predominant in the first component (34.19%). Some promising progenies with interesting characteristics were observed and several hybrid plants were superior to their parents and showed positive heterosis over their parents. Progenies NIOP5 and NIOP8 were superior in the most studied attributes, therefore, they suggested for further investigations which can be used in breeding programs. Progenies showed a wider range for flower diameter, peduncle thickness, bush height, as well as inner and outer tepal dimensions. Flower color also showed wider range in the progenies and purple, violet and white colors were the most frequent colors in the hybrid plants, while lilac color was the rarest one. Results of our investigation revealed that intervarietal hybridization is an effective way to contribute to the phenotypic variation in the iris flower for producing new plant materials for breeding purposes as well as releasing new cultivars. The inheritance of some of the traits identified in this study will be important for improving plant architecture in German iris plant.

In present study, essential oil content and compositions of 49 Iranian landraces of Damask rose (Rosa damascena Mill.) was investigated. Essential oils were isolated with distillation method and component composition was determined with gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (GC/MS). Twenty main compounds were identified in the essential oil representing about 90% of the total oil. The major components were found to be n-nonadecane (with seasonal range of 32.4-36.1%), n-heneicosane (20.3-22.1%), citronellol (6.6-10.3%), n-hexadecanol (6.4-6.7%) and n-tricosane (5.9-7.0%). The percentages of citronellol and geraniol as the two important compounds of the rose oil quality in 2008 were more than their percentages in 2007. Therefore, it can be inferred that dry conditions increased the aliphatic compounds percentages and reduced alcoholic compounds in the rose oil. Despite the differences in origin sites, climates and ecological conditions among landraces, the results of cluster analysis (CA) revealed that all of the landraces of Damask rose with exception of KB1 and AK1 showed more than 90% similarity in their major oil composition. The result of principal component analysis (PCA) revealed that the landraces with the highest percentage of citronellol and geraniol components usually show extreme values (positive or negative) of PC1 and PC2.

Fumaria vaillantii (Fumariaceae) is an annual plant which is growing in a wide diversity area of Iran which has been used traditionally in the folk medicine. Antioxidants have great importance to reduce oxidative stress and prevention of damage to biological molecules. The present study was designed to investigate the antioxidant activity of ethanolic extract from aerial parts of Fumaria vaillantii L. by using three different methods including 2, 2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH), Ferric reducing antioxidant power (FRAP) and Phosphomolybdenum complex at three different growth stages. In addition, total phenolic contents of the extracts were determined using Folin-Ciocalteu method. According to the obtained results, the total phenol contents of aerial parts harvested at vegetative, budding and flowering stages were 68.38, 71.11 and 56.42 mg GAE/g extract, respectively. Antioxidant activities of the extracts were decreased from vegetative to flowering stages in DPPH and FRAP methods. In conclusion, ethanolic extract from vegetative stage of Iranian F. vaillantii can be considered as a potential source of natural antioxidants for food and pharmaceutical industries.

In this study, a sensitive, accurate and reproducible high performance liquid chromatographic method was developed for determination of diosgenin from fenugreek (Trigonella foenum-graecum) leaves in 22 ecotypes of Iranian fenugreek. The obtained results showed that the highest concentration of diosgenin with 23.8 mg g-1dw was found in Boshruyeh ecotype. While, Mashhad ecotype with 3.51 mg g-1dw diosgenin contained the lowest concentration of diosgenin. The method employed in current study confirmed significant variations in the diosgenin concentration in Iranian fenugreek. Therefore, Iranian fenugreek can be considered as a new potential crop and source of diosgenin in the pharmaceutical industry.