Use of agricultural waste material as an alternative substrate in cabbage seedling production and development

Abstract

Considering the need to reduce costs in the production of seedlings, the use of agricultural wastes becomes essential. The objective of this study was to evaluate a substrate composed of agricultural residues replacing the commercial substrate. The experiment was carried out in two phases. For the first phase, seedling production, we used a completely randomized design with six treatments and eight replications, using commercial substrate (Bioplant®) and five treatments with increasing proportions of moinha/descending proportions of rice husk (0/40; 10/30; 20/20; 30/10 and 40/0%), and fixed proportions of coconut fiber (15%) and pine bark (45%). We evaluated plant height, stem diameter, number of leaves, root and shoot dry masses, and Dickson quality index at 33 days after sowing. In the second experiment, cabbage development under field conditions, the treatments were maintained with four replications, using the randomized block design. We evaluated cycle length, compactness, head and stem diameter, number of basal external leaves, mass of fresh matter of the head, and commercial yield. We recommend a substrate composed of 40% moinha, 15% coconut fiber, and 45% pine bark in the production of cabbage seedlings, replacing the commercial substrate.