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Abstract(s)
Grape marc and pine bark were composted in windrows for a period of three
months, supplied with 1kg of nitrogen (urea) m-3
. Grape marc compost (GMC) and
pine bark compost (PBC) had, respectively, 84.3 and 85.0% v/v total pore space,
10.3 and 1.2 % v/v easily available water, 59% and 32.0% v/v air capacity, 53.0 and
25.9 % v/v total water content. Rockwool (Grodan®) has higher total pore space
(96.7% v/v) and total water content (81.8% v/v) but lower air capacity (14.9% v/v).
Rockwool, GMC and PBC were compared as plant substrates for growing a
greenhouse tomato crop. Plants of tomato 'Sinatra' (Sluis & Groot, Holland) were
grown on 15 L rockwool slabs and on 30 L bags of compost, in a heated plastic
greenhouse, from December to June. A nutrient solution with the same chemical
composition was used for the three substrates, varying the composition according to
plant development. The irrigation period was pre-set and the irrigation frequency
was controlled by solar radiation. Fruits were collected twice a week, from March to
June, weighted and selected. There were no significant differences in yield and fruit
quality between substrates. Commercial yield on GMC was 16.6 kg m-2
, on PBC
15.5 kg m-2 and on RW 16.2 kg m-2
. Temperature in composts showed a higher
resistance to daily variation. We observed a good root development after the crop,
specially in GMC. Positive changes in the physical properties of composts occurred
during the growing period, particularly the increase in water content of GMC and
in aeration capacity of PBC, indicating a potential re-using the composts, which was
lately confirmed by growing a second and third tomato crop, on GMC (open and
closed systems1) and on PBC (open system2).
Description
Keywords
Tomato Lycopersicum esculentum Mill Rockwool Fruit yield Fruit quality
Citation
Publisher
International Society for Horticultural Science (ISHS)