Evaluación de la calidad de Lilium cv. Pensacola abonado con lixiviados de humus de lombriz

Abstract

Among bulbs plan species, the genus Lilium is becoming more important due to its great number of colors and shapes. Those species are relative easy to crop and with low nutritional and environmental demands; thus, in Mexico in highly cultivated. Enhancement of crop management includes environmental friendly techniques; also generating good fertilization doses for higher yield. However, higher fertilization doses provoke environmental and human damages. Specifically, compost tea from worm humus is a good organic source of nutrients and its use might reduce previous damages. Thus, objective of present work was to “Evaluate preharvest and postharvest development of Lilium ´Pensacola´ fertilized with worm compost tea”. Three fertilization treatments were used: Chemical fertilization was obtained from previous works suggesting application, every 20 days, of 40 ml per pot of a mix of 19.2 g L-1 of calcium nitrate and 19.2 g L-1 of a commercial “Nitrofoska”. On the other hand, in the second treatment, 29.2 ml of worm humus tea was added, both, to substrate and foliar; finally, third treatment consisted of that dose of worm compost tea plus 29.2 ml per pot of 50 ml of the commercial “Kelik” in 2.5 ml in the substrate, and 5 ml of “Kelik” in 2.5 ml of water to the leaves. Although commercial fertilizer presented lower amount of nitrogen per pot, those plants treated with that fertilizer showed higher greenness index than those plants treated with worm compost tea. Nevertheless, worm compost tea improves plant height and vase life. Number of flowers was not affected for the source of nutrients. Additionally, in the plants treated with chemical fertilizer, it was necessary to apply chemical fungicides to reduce the attack of Botrytis. The cost of compost tea was $0.15 lower than the chemical fertilizer per pot. Thus, in a 1000 plant production, the productor would save $150.0.