Effect of cattle manure, olive mill compost and peat moss on germination and growth of tomato and pepper seedlings

Abstract EN

The experiments were carried out under partially controlled glass house, belongs to theAgricultural Research Station, Faculty of Agriculture, Al-Rabba, Mu'tah University.

The aim of this study was to evaluate the impact of nine potting media mixtures, peat moss: perlite (3:1), manure: perlite (3:1), Olive pomace : perlite (3:1), peat moss: manure: perlite (2:1:1), manure: Olive pomace: perlite (2:1:1), peat moss: Olive pomace: perlite (1:2:1), peat moss: manure: perlite (1:2:1), pomace: manure: perlite (2:1:1), and peat moss: pomace: perlite (2:1:1) on emergence of seedlings of Tomato (Lycopersiconesculantum Mill.), and Pepper (Capsicum annum L.).

The results revealed that the peat moss: manure: perlite (2:1:1) media tended to increase the germination percentage and rate.

Results of this study showed better response of tomato seedlings than pepper seedlings in most parameters like (germination percentage, fresh weight of seedlings shoot, leaves number per seedling, stem diameter of seedlings, leaf area of seedlings and height of seedlings after 30 day from sowing.

While the highest positive effect ofpotting media mixture for both tomato and pepper was obtained at peat moss: manure: perlite 2: 1: 1 even more than commercial media, peat moss: perlite 3:1 from other hand the mixture of peat moss: olive pomace : perlite (2:1:1) resulted with the lowest response in most measured characters in both tomato and pepper.