PERFORMANCE OF TOMATO AT DIFFERENT SALINITY LEVELS

Abstract

A pot experiment was conducted at the Horticulture Farm in Sher-e-Bangla Agricultural University, Dhaka, Bangladesh during the period of November, 2018 to March, 2019. The experiment was comprised of five salinity levels viz., S ; S 2 = 3 dS m -1 ; S 3 = 6 dS m -1 ; S 4 = 9 dS m -1 and S 5 = 12 dS m -1 combined with seven varieties of tomato viz., V 1 = BARI Tomato 2; V 2 = BARI Tomato 11; V = BARI Tomato 14; V 4 = BARI Tomato 15; V 5 = BARI Tomato 17; V = BARI Tomato 18 and V 7 6 = BARI Tomato 19. The experiment was laid out on Randomized Complete Block Design with three replications. Results revealed that S showed the highest positive result in most of the cases including plant height, number of flower plant 1 and fruit weight plant -1 (1003.0 g) except total soluble solids (1.64%) that was increased with increase in salinity levels. On the other hand, the lowest results regarding all of the parameters studied except total soluble solids (2.76%) were found from S . Though growth and yield of tomato varied with the variation in varieties, BARI Tomato 11 (V 2 ) showed the best result in terms of plant height (cm), number of flower plant , number of fruits plant -1 and total soluble solids (3.22%). On the other hand, the lowest result in respect of plant height (cm) was recorded from V . However, number of flower plant -1 , number of fruits plant -1 1 and total soluble solids (1.80%) were found the lowest from V 3 . The highest fruit weight plant -1 (1235.90 g) was shown by V and the minimum from V (333.1 g) due to its smaller fruit size. The maximum results of plant height, number of flower plant 2 -1 and number of fruits plant -1 were found from S 1 V 2 ,

whereas, the lowest results of plant height was obtained from S However, the lowest number of flower plant -1 and number of fruits plant -1 were found from S 5 V 3 .

The maximum fruit weight plant -1 (1640.09 g) was recorded from S due to its larger fruit length and diameter, whereas, the minimum from S 5 V (271.1 g). The maximum total soluble solids was found from S 5 V (5.70 %), however, the minimum total soluble solids was obtained from S 1 V 6 2 . On the basis of yield S was best among the treatment combinations.

2 5 1 V 1 = 0 dS m -1 1. V 5 1 1 3 1 V 1 -1 -1