A GRADUATING agriculture student discovered that ratooning can make mature eggplants (Solanum melongena L.) productive again.
In a study, Zuitte Cairra Martinez Rom, a scholar at the De La Salle Araneta University in Salikneta Farm, Upper Ciudad Real, City of San Jose del Monte, Bulacan, determined that ratooned mature eggplants fertilized with vermicompost and supplemented with foliar fertilizer—through different methods and rates of applications—produced viable results.
Ratooning is a method that involves pruning the plants back to several inches above the soil line to encourage new growth with reinvigorated flowering and pod production.
Results of the study showed that application of Amino Plus Foliar Fertilizer, either through foliar spraying or soil drenching that supplemented the vermicompost, induced flowering within 18 days after ratooning or cutting of the matured (unproductive) eggplants.
The results clearly indicated that the simultaneous flowering of ratooned eggplants, which was significantly earlier than those plants under the control method, was due to the additional nutrients contributed by Amino Plus that was supplemented to the vermicompost which is applied to the experimental plants.
Likewise, ratooned eggplants significantly produced the highest marketable yield per plot.
PROCEDURE
A single factor experiment with five treatments and three replications arranged in Randomized Complete Block Design (RCBD) was used in the study. A total area of 62 square meters previously planted with eggplant was used. The area was divided into five rows of 15.5-meter length with one meter distance in between rows.
This story is from the September 2017 edition of Agriculture.
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This story is from the September 2017 edition of Agriculture.
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