Different growing media effect on the cutting quality of two dragon fruit species (Hylocerues sp.)

Abstract

Background and Objective: Plant propagation is one the important factors in plant and fruit production. Many problems have been arisen in dragon fruit propagation, such as the yellowing and the rooting inability of cuttings. To solve this problem, the understanding how to choose suitable growing media is needed. This study was conducted to investigate the effects of different growing media compositions on dragon fruit propagation. Materials and Methods: The experiment was conducted in Green House, Faculty of Agriculture, Universitas Padjadjaran from June to September, 2017. Six growing media compositions were used for two species of dragon fruit (H. undatus and H. polyrhizus): soil (v), soil+sand (1:1/v:v), soil+compost (1:1/v:v), soil+vermicompost (1:1/v:v), soil+sand+compost (1:1:1/v:v:v) and soil+sand+vermicompost (1:1:1/v:v:v). Results: The results showed that soil+vermicompost (1:1/v:v) and soil+sand+compost (1:1:1/v:v:v) gave the best growth results for the two dragon fruit species by increasing the number of shoots and the lengths of the shoots. Conclusion: It was concluded that vermicompost was better growing media than compost for propagating dragon fruit by cuttings.