ISHS Acta Horticulturae 504: VI Symposium on Stand Establishment and ISHS Seed Symposium
STAND DIFFERENCES IN NO-TILL AND PLASTICULTURE DIRECT SEEDED AND TRANSPLANTED CUCUMBERS (CUCUMIS SATIVUS L.) |
| Authors: | M. O. Ogutu, John S. Caldwell |
| Keywords: | Cucumber, no-till, direct seeding, transplants, vetch, Vicia villosa |
| Abstract:
Stand establishments of direct seeded and transplanted cucumbers were compared under no-till and plasticulture where a rye/vetch mixture was used as cover crop. Grain rye, Secale cereale L. (Poceae), and hairy vetch, Vicia villosa Roth (Fabaceae) were seeded with grain rye as the winter nurse crop for hairy vetch. There were no differences among treatment plots in the dry weight of cover crop samples taken prior to cucumber seeding. Under no-till conditions transplants had a higher dry weight at three weeks after planting (3 WAP) than direct seeded seedlings. Direct seeded treatments had higher cucumber plant dry weight when rye/vetch was incorporated under black plastic mulch than when seeded into black plastic mulch without incorporated vetch. In the second sampling at six WAP, cucumber plant dry weights were higher in direct seeded than in transplanted plots, indicating that greater growth in no-till plots compensated for the earlier slow establishment. Transplants flowered and developed fruits earlier than direct seeded cucumbers, resulting in higher early yields, but there were no significant differences among treatments in cumulative marketable and total yields over all harvests. | |
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