The effect of soil texture and irrigation method on improving yield and yield components of two Sweet potato [Ipomoea batatas (L.) Lam.] cultivars

Subject Areas : Journal of Plant Ecophysiology

Mansoureh Shamili ^{1 *} , hamed Hassanzadeh Khankahdani ²

1 - Assistant Prof. of Hormozgan University
2 - Researcher of Agricultural Research Station of Minab

Received: 2015-02-10 Accepted : 2015-06-30 Published : 2016-09-01

Keywords: Soil texture, Crop per drip (CPD), Irrigation method, Storage root,

Abstract :

In order to determine optimum culture condition to produce high quality storage roots in sweet potato, an experiment was conducted as split-split plot in randomized complete block design with three replications. Main plots were allocated to soil texture (loamy and sandy), sub plots to irrigation method (furrow and drip) and sub-sub plots to sweet potato cultivars (White and Red). Cutting establishment percent, bush vegetative growth, qualitative and quantitative characteristics of storage root as well as crop per drip (CPD) were measured. Results showed that soil texture affects foliage fresh weight, shoot/root ratio, storage root number, weight and diameter, stem and leaf number, bush length, reducing and total sugar as well as CPD. Irrigation method influenced all the traits except root number. The greatest CPD was observed in loamy soil using drip irrigation respectively 5.492 and 4.569 kg/m3 for White and Red cultivar. According to path analysis results, storage root yield directly influenced by foliage fresh weight (0.726**), leaf number (0.722**), stem number (0.710**), storage root weight (0.668**), storage root diameter (0.449**), foliage length (0.352**) and storage root length (0.314**). Based on the obtained results, cultivation of Red cultivar on loamy soil using furrow irrigation at cutting establishment stage, drip irrigation during growth period and final furrow irrigation at storage root filling is more successful as a tool to produce high quality sweet potato storage root in Minab.