Effect of Plant growing Structures and Media on Yield of Tomato in the Rooftop Garden

Abstract

This experiment was carried out at the rooftop garden of the Department of Agricultural Botany, Sher-e-Bangla Agricultural University (SAU), Dhaka-1207, Bangladesh from October 2017 to March 2018 to evaluate the response of tomato to different plant growing structures and composition of growing media in the rooftop garden. The experiment had two factors, factor A- two plant growing structures, viz., S1 = Plastic pot, S2 = Earthen pot and factor B - six different plant growing medium viz. M0 = Soil 100% (w/w) + inorganic fertilizer (IF)/(control), M1 = Soil 80% (w/w) + 20% cowdung (w/w) + IF, M2 = Soil 70% (w/w) + 30% cowdung (w/w) + IF, M3 = Soil 90% (w/w) + 10% vermicompost (w/w) + IF, M4 = Soil 80% (w/w) + 20% vermicompost (w/w) + IF, M5 = Soil 80% (w/w) + 10% cowdung (w/w) + 10% vermicompost (w/w) + IF. The factorial experiment was laid out in a Completely Randomized Design (CRD) with four replications. The experimental results yield contributing characters and yield of tomato significantly influenced by different plant growing structures and various composition of plant growing media and also their combination. Considering plant growing structures, the S1 gave the highest flower clusters per plant, flowers per plant, fruit length and fruit breadth.  The maximum yield of fruits per plant (1.69 kg) was also obtained from plastic pot. The M5 had the highest flower clusters per plant, flowers per plant, fruit length and fruit diameter. The maximum yield of fruits per plant (2.17 kg) was recorded from the M5. The highest yield of fruits per plant (2.15 kg) was obtained from the treatment combination of S1M5. This experimental results suggest that S1M5 be able to increase the fruit yield of BARI tomato14 for rabi season in the rooftop garden.