Produção de frutos e qualidade fisiológica de sementes de tomate em função do espaçamento e posição do cacho floral sob sistema orgânico em Seropédica - RJ

Abstract

There is a lack of research related to the production technology of tomato seeds in the organic system. In this scenario, the objective of this study was to evaluate the effect of plant spacing on fruit production and physiological quality of seeds of different floral clusters on two tomato cultivars under greenhouse system at the Centro de Pesquisa em Agricultura Orgânica da PESAGRO-RIO (CEPAO/PESAGRO-RIO), in the municipality of Seropédica, Rio de Janeiro. The open - pollinated cultivars: Perinha (cherry tomato) and Roma (Italian tomato) were used. To evaluate the production components, the experimental design was in randomized blocks in split-plots, with four replications. Each cultivar was analyzed separately in the experiment, where two planting densities were assigned as main plots: the spacings of 0.40 and 0.60 m between plants; and five cluster positions were assigned as sub-plots: 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th clusters. Each plot consisted of two crop lines with 8.00 m in length and spaced by 1.00 m, the plants located at the ends of each plot were border, therefore, in the spacing of 0.40 m, the useful plot consisted of 18 plants, and the spacing of 0.60 m the useful plot was 11 plants. No significant interaction was found in the analysis of variance between spacing and cluster position by the 5% F test, except for transversal and longitudinal diameters. Both cultivars presented higher fruit and seed yields in the 0.40 x 1.00 m spacing. The average fruit yield per cluster (t/ha) and number of fruits per cluster varied between 1.57 and 2.60 t/ha and 7.15 and 8.67 fruits, for the cultivar Perinha, and between 4, 09 and 7.83 t/ha and 5.94 and 7.29 fruits, for the cultivar Roma. While the production of seeds varied between 8.87 and 14.91 kg/ha (Perinha) and 6.61 and 9.21 kg/ha (Roma), for the different cluster positions, respectively. From the five harvests performed during the field experiment, six seed lots were formed with the respective combinations between spacing and cluster position for the evaluation of the physiological quality characteristics. For this experiment, a completely randomized experimental design was used, with four replications. It was possible to separate the lots and their physiological potential by the tests of germination, first count of germination, seedling emergence, index of emergency speed and computerized analysis of seedling performance. None of the lots presented germination below the standard stipulated for commercialization of tomato seeds in Brazil.