Effect of pre harvest spray and vase solutions under different growing environment on the vase life of cut foliage Dracaena (D. reflexa)

Abstract

An experiment was carried out at the Department of Floriculture and Landscape Architecture, HC& RI, TNAU, Coimbatore from December 2019 to March 2020 to study the effect of pre harvest spray and vase solutions of cut stalks of Dracaena plants grown under different growing environments, viz., open and shade. Six pre harvest foliar sprays of GA3 at different concentrations, viz., 250 ppm, 300 ppm and 350 ppm were given at every fortnight interval to the foliage plants grown under open and shade conditions. The cut stalks of Dracaena were placed in different vase solutions viz., Distilled water (control), 2% CaCl2, 1 mM Salicylic acid, 4% Sucrose, 2% CaCl2 + 1 mM Salicylic acid, 2% CaCl2 + Sucrose 4%, 1 mM Salicylic acid+ Sucrose 4%, Sucrose 4% + 1 mM Salicylic acid + 2% CaCl2 etc., to investigate the efficacy in extending the post-harvest life of cut stalks of Dracaena. The physical and physiological parameters like the number of dried leaves, physiological loss in weight, vase life, relative fresh weight (RFW) and vase solution uptake were measured at every 5 days as indicators of cut stem quality. The vase solution of calcium chloride (2%) along with sucrose (4%) showed increased vase life of 21.13 days when compared with control (distilled water) with 17.38 days.