EVALUATION OF FLOAT TRAYS WITH HIGH CELL NUMBERS ON STAND COUNTS AND YIELDS IN A CLOSE-GROWN TOBACCO PRODUCTION SYSTEM

Abstract New applications for tobacco plants as manufacturing systems for medical and industrial products are in a sufficiently advanced stage of development that attention is now being directed at the efficiency and cost effectiveness of crop production. The greenhouse costs associated with raising transplants are an important factor, partly because the high planting density of these new tobacco crops in the field will greatly increase the number of transplants needed per unit area of production, and thus the overall cost of the crop, and partly because the transgenic transplants that will be used in some strategies will need to be raised in more stringently quarantined greenhouse facilities according to governmental regulations. Thus minimizing the square footage of greenhouse space for the production of transplants is a desirable objective. The float-bed system that is now widely used to produce tobacco transplants can physically accommodate a higher transplant density than is conventionally employed, ...