مريــم محمــد ســلام

ملخص الدراسة

فهرس الـمحتويات

Summary

Two  field  experiments  were  carried out at The  Research  Farm  of

Nasser's Faculty of Agricultural Sciences during 2005 / 2006 and 2006 / 2007 seasons, to study the effect of intercropping tomato and some of leafy vegetable crops, on growth, yield and quality characteristics of tomato, in addition to some of the competitive relationships.

This study included two factors as follows:

  i.  Intercropping crop: coriander, rocket salad and Jew's mallow

  ii.  Intercropping system: 100 %:50 %, 100 %:75 % and 100 % :100 % (as a proportion of leafy crop: tomato).

Tomato, coriander, rocket salad and Jew's mallow were planted alone (sole crop) as a control treatments. The experimental design was randomize completely block with three replicates.

The obtained results could be summarized as follows:

a.  Effect of intercropping on vegetative growth characters of tomato:

1.  Plant height: 

§  Tomato plants that intercropped with coriander or rocket salad plants recoded the highest values of plant height compared with tomato plants that grow as a sole crop (control).

§  Intercropping system 100 % :100 % exhibited the highest values of plant height. 

§  Interaction of (rocket salad × 75), (Jew's mallow × 50) at the first season and (coriander × 100), (Jew's mallow × 100) and (rocket salad × 75) at the second season were surpassed with tomato plant height compared with other treatments.

2.  Number of branches / plants:

Tomato plants as a solo crop were surpassed with number of branches compared with the different intercropping treatments. Differences were only significant during the second season.

3.  Number of leaves / plant:

§  The highest values of number of leaves per plant were recorded by rocket salad, control and coriander for the first season, and with solo crop (control) for the second season.

§  Intercropping system 100%:50% (tomato : leafy crop) gave the highest number of leaves per tomato plant at the first season, whereas control (tomato alone) recorded the highest values in the second season. 

§  Interactions of (Jew's mallow × 50)  and (rocket salad × 100) were surpassed during the first season, but control treatment exhibited the highest one at the second season with number of leaves per plant.

4.  Plant fresh and dry weight:

§  Tomato plants that planted as a solo crop (control) exhibited the highest values of fresh and dry weight per plant compared with intercropping factors (crop and system) during the two season with significantly differences.

§  With respect the effect of interaction between intercropping crop and system on fresh  and dry weight of tomato plants interactions of (rocket salad × 50 or 100) or (Jew's mallow × 100) did not significantly different with control (solo crop) during the first and second seasons, respectively, in which it recorded the highest values of fresh weight of tomato plants.

§  Interaction of (Jew's mallow × 100) produced the highest values of plant dry weight at the second season, whereas, control – tomato as a solo crop – produced the highest values at the first season.

b. Effect of intercropping on yield and its components of tomato:

§  Tomato plants that planted as a solo crop – control – produced the highest values of number of fruits per plant, average fruit weight, individual plant yield and total yield per hectare, compared with other used factors (intercropping crops or systems)  as a main effects during the two seasons of this study.

§  With regard to the effect of interaction between cropping system and crop on tomato yield and its components, (rocket salad × 100) and (Jew's mallow × 100) exhibited the highest values of fruits per plant at the first and second seasons, respectively.

§  Interactions of (rocket salad × 50) and (coriander × 75) did not significantly different with control in average fruit weight during the first season, whereas (Jew's mallow × 50) recorded the highest values on average fruit weight at the second season.

§  Interaction of (rocket salad × 100) produced the highest values of individual plant yield, but different with control treatment – solo crop – did not reach the limits of significance, during the first season, whereas control treatment produced the highest values during the second season.

§  Regarding to the effect of interaction between cropping crop and system on total yield of tomato, results pointed that interaction of (rocket salad × 100) the highest values, but did not significantly different with solo crop treatment (control), at the first season, whereas, (Jew's mallow × 75) and (Jew's mallow × 100) produced the highest values at the second season with no differences with control treatment

c. Effect of intercropping on some of tomato fruits quality characteristics:

1.  Percentage total soluble solids:

Differences between used factors and treatments did not reach the limits of significances during the two seasons

2.  Percentage total sugars:

§  Tomato fruits that produced from plants grown as a solo crop - control treatments-contained the highest values of total sugars compared with other intercropping treatments. Differences were only significant at the first season in this regard.

3.  Percentage titritable acidity:  

§  Tomato fruits that produced from plants grown as solo crop contained the highest values of titritable acidity compared with intercropped tomato with different leafy crops.

d. Effect of intercropping on total yield of pure stand of any of leafy vegetable crops:

§  Total yield of leafy crops (coriander, rocket salad and Jew's mallow) that planted as a sole crop was greater than those when planted by intercropping with tomato. With respect intercropping methods, coriander, rocket salad or Jew's mallow that intercropped with tomato (100 %:100 %) produced the highest values of total yield per hectare compared with other systems of intercropping (100 % : 75 %) and (100 % : 50 %).

E. Effect of intercropping on some of the competitive relation ship and yield advantage:

§  Land Equivalent Ratio (LER):

Intercropping tomato and some of the leafy vegetable crops (coriander, rocket salad and Jew's mallow) increased LER values more than one under all studied systems of intercropping during first season, whereas, increase was only recorded with four systems (coriander × 100, rocket salad × 75 and Jew's mallow × 75 and 100) during second season.

The highest values of LER were as follows:

  1.  Intercropping tomato with Jew's mallow (1.50 and 1.49) for the 

   first and second season, respectively.

  2. Intercropping tomato with rocket salad (1.36 and 1.05) for the

  first and second season, respectively.

  3. Intercropping tomato with coriander (1.33 and 1.29) for the first

  and second season, respectively.

These highest values of LER were achieved when tomato intercropping with those leafy crops according to used systems as follows:

  1.  100 % : 100 % (tomato: Jew's mallow) during the two seasons.

  2.  100 % : 100 % and 100 % : 75 %  (tomato: rocket salad) for the

  First and second system, respectively

  3. 100 % : 100 % (tomato: coriander)during the two seasons.

Yield advantage was achieved with intercropping tomato and all studied leafy vegetable crops under nine and four systems, during first and second seasons, respectively.

§  Relative Crowding Coefficient (K)

Relative crowding coefficient excesses one when tomato intercropped with any of leafy vegetable crops (coriander, rocket salad and Jew's mallow) under all intercropping systems, at the first season, and four systems during the second season. Obtained results indicated the yield advantage.

§  Tomato coefficient was almost higher than leafy vegetable crops coefficient under the different intercropping systems. 

§  Aggressivity (A)

Aggressivity showed that tomato was the dominant component and any of coriander, rocket salad or Jew's mallow was the dominated in all intercropping systems, with exception that of intercropping tomato + Jew's mallow (100%:75%) during the first season, which tomato was dominated and Jew's mallow was dominant.

§  Tomato - leafy crops relationship when grown together as intercropping was a completeness for the closely compatibility of each of tomato and the different leafy crops (coriander, rocket salad and Jew's mallow).