Effect of irrigation and Zinc nutrition on growth and yield of essential oil (Salvia officinalis L.)

Aim & : To study the effect of irrigation and zinc nutrition on yield and essential oil production of (Salvia officinalis L.), a field experiment was conducted at the College of Agriculture, Islamic Azad University of Khoy during spring 2013.
Material and The experiment was conducted as a factorial based on complete randomized block design with four replications. The effects of irrigation in four levels including 100, 80, 60, 40 % (FC) and zinc nutrition in four levels including 0 (control), 2.5, 5, 10 mg/kg (ZnSO4) were investigated.
The results showed that the effect of irrigation on plant height, number of leaves, stem diameter, fresh weight and dry weight were significant (p ≤1%). The highest oil yield (20.91 kg/ha) was obtained with 100% humidity. The results also showed that zinc spraying on the height, number of branches, leaves, internodes, fresh and dry weight, and percentage of essential oil was significant (p≤0.01). Zinc Spraying and watering on only the main stem diameter and plant height was also significant (p≤0.05). The highest essential oil yield (15.81) was obtained in 2.5 mg/kg (ZnSO4).
According to our results it is recommended to increase the essential oil yield using 100% humidity and 2.5 mg/kg (ZnSO4) in (Salvia officinalis L.).