Plantain (Musa AAB. cv Agbagba) Setts Growth in Response to Growing Media and Organic Fertilizers in South Western Nigeria

Summary in the original language of the document

The is a research work on plantain and is submitted Micro propagation of plantain or banana is posited as a means to produce great number of healthy plants but the technicality and expertise involved is not what an average farmer or grower can handle. The ability to transfer plantlets from in vitro conditions to greenhouse or field environment at low cost and with high survival rates is germane to its success. The increasing demand for plantain fruit in the recent times had led to tremendous increase in demand for vigorous plantain plantlets or suckers to establish new plantations expand the existing ones or rehabilitate the moribund ones. A study was conducted between November 2012 and April 2013 at the Organic skill demonstration plot, Federal University of Agriculture Abeokuta (7° 15ˈN, 3° 25ˈE) to examine the effects growth media and organic fertilizer on the setts of Plantain cv Agbagba as a rapid local and adaptive alternate means of suckers multiplication. The 3 x 2 factorial experiment was laid out in a CRD with four replicates. The growth media were top soil (TS), Sawdust (SD) and a mixture of TS and SD (TSSD). The organic fertilizers were fortified Gateway organic fertilizer (GOMF) and Cured poultry manure (CPM) applied at 10 t/ha and no fertilizer as control (C). Application of organic fertilizers was as described by Baiyeri and Tenkouano, 2007. Setts from plantain corms from freshly harvested stands were pared cut into bits of 300 g, dusted with wood ash and air dried for a week prior to planting. Data were collected from 5 weeks after planting (WAP) on number of leaves, plant height, stem diameter, leaf area, canopy diameter, root length and number of root. The result indicated a superior performance of setts planted in TSSD with CPM (26.7cm, 4.0, 62.4 cm, 24.7 cm) for plant height, number of leaves, canopy and stem circumference compared to plantlets in TS only with or without organic fertilizer with lowest values (0.7 cm. 2.3, 62.2cm, 9.0 cm) respectively.