Produção de mudas de variedades de pitaia em sistema semi-hidropônico e convencional

Abstract

The dragon fruit is a cactus, native to the tropical and subtropical regions of America. This crop in recent years has gained a lot of attention due to the exotic characteristics of its fruits and their nutritional properties. As it is a recent crop in Brazil, there is a lack of studies related to cultural practices and seedling production. Research indicates that producing seedlings using hydroponics can reduce the time it takes to obtain fruitful seedlings. Thus, the objective of the work was to evaluate the growth of seedlings of dragon fruit varieties under two cultivation systems, conventional and semi-hydroponic in floating mode. Two experiments were installed in different locations at the Federal University of Lavras, in the municipality of Lavras-MG. One of the experiments was conducted in the floating system in the Ornamental Plants, Green Areas and Urban Afforestation Research Sector, the other experiment was conducted in the conventional cultivation system in the Fruit Growing Sector. The experiments were conducted under a randomized block design (DBC), with five treatments, four blocks and five plants per plot, totaling 200 cuttings with a length between 30 and 40 cm. Half of the cladodes were used in the conventional system, the cuttings were planted in plastic bags with a capacity of 3.5 dm3 filled with commercial substrate. The other half of the cladodes were planted in cytropots with a capacity of 3.8 dm3 filled with vermiculite and placed on a plastic support in a “pool” specific to the semi-hydroponic system. The treatments consisted of five varieties of dragon fruit: Common White (Selenicereus undatus); UFLA Red (Hylocereus polyrhizus); Dark Star (S. guatemalensis x S. undatus); Colombian Yellow (S. megalanthus) and Golden (S. undatus x S. undatus). After 90 days, the following were evaluated: shoot length, shoot diameter, main root length, root volume, fresh mass and dry mass of roots and shoots, Dickson Quality Index. The means obtained were subjected to analysis of variance using the Shapiro-Wilk, O’Neill and Mathews and Tukey tests at 5% significance. All statistical analyzes were carried out with the help of Software R. It was observed that the semi-hydroponic system provided greater results for all variables evaluated. In both locations, the Common White variety showed greater growth. The red varieties of UFLA, Golden and White common had the highest Dickson Quality Index. It is concluded that the semi-hydroponic system is a viable technique for producing high-quality dragon fruit seedlings.