Desenvolvimento de Kalanchoe Luciae cultivado em diferentes substratos e condições de sombreamento

Abstract

Succulents are plants that have great commercial importance, however, due to their large species diversity, little is known about the necessary growing conditions for each one of them. Like this, the purpose of this work was to evaluate the development of Kalanchoe luciae, growing in different substrate, inorganic fertilizers, shading levels and spectral alteration. Three experiments were set to evaluate the effect of adding different kinds of fertilizers, different coconut´s fibers as growing substrate and conventional substrate with or without fertilizers, the plants were kept under different shading screen. The evaluated parameters were: leaves number, plant height, plant diameter, the fifth leaf diameter, roots and leaves dry matter weight, foliar and anatomical analysis. It was observed that K. luciae plants developed with the help of NPK 10:10:10, but, overgrew the aerial part not presenting the required commercial standard for the species when growing in standard substrate (1 soil: 1 sand: 1 vermiculite). Plants did not show any difference in their growth when coconut´s fibers were used and also, did not show any aerial overgrowth having the right trade pattern. Plants kept under shading using 30% black screen (Sombrite®) and growing in substrate standard with the addition of charcoal showed to be more suitable to the trade standards. By their anatomical analyses, the meshes did not give any difference related to the stomata density (mm2). Epidermis thickness (adaxial and abaxial) had difference accordingly to the used screen. Plants growing under 50% black screen (Sombrite®) showed thicker mesophyll.