Investigating the effect of different cultivation media on some morphological traits of gerbera flower (Gerbera jamesoni) C.V Rosalin

Today, various organic and mineral materials are used as a culture medium. Each of these materials has unique characteristics. In general, these materials should have water retention capacity, sufficient ventilation, proper drainage, and high cation exchange capacity, and they should not have any adverse or harmful effects on the plant. In order to investigate the possibility of replacing the cocopeat and perlite culture medium with new and inexpensive culture mediums obtained from waste organic materials and mineral compounds in the cultivation of Rosaline gerbera cuttings, a research was conducted based on a completely randomized block statistical design with 7 treatments and 3 replications. The treatments used include cocopit 50% + perlite 50% (control), cocopit 50% + leaf soil 50%, perlite 50% + leaf soil 50%, perlite 50% + vermicompost 50%, garden soil 35% + perlite 15% + cocopit 50%, garden soil 35% + perlite 15% + leaf soil 50% and garden soil 35% + perlite 15% + vermicompost 50%. The measured traits were: flower persistence on the plant, stem diameter, stem height, leaf area, number of flowers and number of leaves. Based on the obtained results, the highest number of leaves and flowers, height and stem diameter were observed in the culture medium (50% cocopeat + 50% leaf soil) and the highest amount of leaf surface in the culture medium (50% perlite + 50% vermicompost). In general, the results of this research indicated that the cultivation substrates (cocopit 50% + leaf soil 50%) and (perlite 50% + vermicompost 50%) can be introduced for the cultivation of gerbera cv. rosalin.