Effect of different growing materials and irrigation frequency on some soil properties and yield of two chili cultivars grown in saline soil under greenhouse conditions

บทคัดย่อ

Saline soil is one of limiting factors on crop production in northeastern Thailand. Therefore, the objective of this research was to investigate the effects of different growing materials application and irrigation frequency on some soil properties change, growth and yield of two chili cultivars grown under extreme soil salinity in greenhouse. A 4×4×2 factorial combination in randomized completely block design (RCBD) was laid out in the present experiment. The first factor consists of four growing materials applications; (1) coarse sand alone, (2) coarse sand+M.calabura dry leaves, (3) coarse sand+M.calabura dry leaves+polymer and (4) without growing materials application (control). The results revealed that exchangeable Na⁺ and K⁺, including EC values change in soil with more or less, depending on the growing materials application. The application coarse sand+M.calabura dry leaves+polymer provided better balance of K⁺: Na⁺ ratio in plants, and consequently promoted plants growth and yield of chili. The plants irrigated water twice in the morning and in the late afternoon with the equal amount of water tended to give higher fruit yield than that of the plants irrigated water once in the morning. The cultivar superhot produced significantly (P ≤ 0.05) higher fresh fruit weight per plants (yield) than bird pepper due to greater of single fruit weight of the yield components in the present study.