Enhancing bottle gourd growth and fruit characteristics through the stimulant effects of humic acid, seaweed extract, and salicylic acid

Sayed, Rofayda; Soliman, Wagdi Saber; Salaheldin, Sabri; Gahory, Abd-Allah

doi:10.21608/aujst.2023.325579

Enhancing bottle gourd growth and fruit characteristics through the stimulant effects of humic acid, seaweed extract, and salicylic acid

Document Type : Original papers

Authors

¹ Horticulture Department, Faculty of Agriculture and Natural Resources, Aswan University

² Medicinal and Aromatic Plants Institute, Beni Suef University

³ Horticulture Department, Faculty of Agriculture and Natural Resources, Aswan University, Aswan, Egypt

10.21608/aujst.2023.325579

Abstract

Bottle gourd is a highly nutritious crop with great important as health staples. On the other hand, organic acids have been widely used to improve the quality and quantity of horticultural crops as an alternative to mineral fertilizers, which have shown negative effects on the environment and health. This study was conducted during the two successive seasons 2021 and 2022 at the Agricultural Experimental Farm, Faculty of Agriculture and Natural Resources, Aswan University, Aswan, Egypt. The experiment investigated three plant growth stimulators; humic acid (HA), seaweed extract (SW) and salicylic acid (SA). The study aimed to evaluate the effect of those stimulators on bottle gourd growth and fruit characteristics. The stimulators showed significant effects on growth characteristics such as plant height and number of leaves, but the effects were not clear for number of flowers and fruits. In the same line, the stimulators showed significant effects on fruit dry weight and its seeds dry weight, but not for fruit length and diameter. HA at high concentration (6 g/L) showed high values of both growth and fruit characteristics. Meanwhile SA showed high impact on growth characters at 0.6 g/L, and high dry weight of fruits and its seeds at low 0.2 g/L concentration. From the results of this study, it can be recommended to treat bottle gourd with HA at 6 g/L to ensure significant improvement in both plant growth and fruit characteristics.

Keywords