Quality of Eucalyptus urophylla x E. grandis cuttings as a function of substrate

Abstract

Considering the increasing demand for seedlings of plants for aforestation and the scarcity of raw materials for the substrates used for plant growth, it is necessary to evaluate new components and formulations that ensure the quality of seedlings. In this experiment the development and quality of production of Eucalyptus urophylla x E. grandis seedlings was studied through vegetative propagation, as a function of nine compositions of substrate, produced from fine-grained vermiculite, carbonized rice chaff and coconut fiber in hard plastic tubes of 50 mL as containers. The physical properties of substrates and morphological development and the quality of the root system of seedlings were evaluated at 90 days after staking. The substrates with higher total porosity promotes better quality of the root system, which consequently results in cuttings with larger diameter, shoot and root dry weight and Dickson Quality Index. Other properties for the physical characteristics of substrates other than mentioned in literature can also be considered adequate.