Effects of different substrates on the runner production of the June-bearing strawberry cv. ‘Senga Sengana’

Abstract

Producing high-quality daughter plants of the June-bearing strawberry is very important for fruit production around the year. This study was conducted to investigate the impacts of different substrates on the runner production of the June-bearing strawberry cultivar ‘Senga Sengana’. In April 2019, strawberry mother plants were planted while the daughter plants were examined November 2019. The nursery trial field was separated into four substrate treatments, each included ten strawberry mother plants, approximately homogeneous. The place where the mother plants were planted was with the same substrate (PTS substrate “Pindstrup”) and separated from the field for the rooting of the daughter plants. In the field for the rooting of the daughter plants, four types of substrates were used: The first substrate treatment (S1) (soil 50% – decomposed manure 50%); the second substrate treatment (S2) (PTS substrate “Pindstrup” with modules (pots) with a volume of 200 mL/daughter plant); the third substrate treatment S3 (river sand 50% – soil 50%); lastly, substrate treatment four S4 (sawdust 100%). During the research, several parameters were determined for the mother plants: the crown diameter, number of flowers, number of runners per plant, number of daughter plants per runner and number of daughter plants per plant. The examination of some of the qualitative parameters was also performed on the daughter plants: the crown diameter, root length and number of roots. Based on these parameters, the daughter plants were categorised according to the standards: A++, A+, A, A–, OS (out of the standard). From the examined results, it was concluded that S3 formed the largest number of daughter plants at 123 (A++ 19.1, A+ 45.1, A 28.7, A– 17.8, OS 12.3 plants); S2 formed 69.4 daughter plants, but with the highest standards (A++ 34.7, A+ 33.6, A– 1.1 plants); S4 formed 74.8 daughter plants (A++ 26.2, A+ 30.4, A 14 OS 4.2 plants), while S1 formed 62 daughter plants and showed the worst results for both the number of plants and the standard (A+ 7, A 3.8, A– 0.8, OS 50.4 plants).