A Study on the Effects of Growing Media on Growth of Kale

Abstract

Kale is a highly nutritious vegetable and is becoming increasingly popular. However, important problems in current crop production include soil degradation, limited planting areas, and unsuitable growing media, which result in poor plant growth and yield. One way to solve these problems is to improve suitable growing media for each plant. Therefore, this experiment aimed to study suitable growing media for kale cultivation. The experiment was designed using a Completely Randomized Design (CRD) with 5 treatments and 10 replications per treatment. The treatments were as follow: trt 1 consisted of loamy soil: coconut coir: rice husk: cow manure: chicken manure at a ratio of 1:1:1:1:0.5; trt 2 consisted of soil: rice husk mixed with cow manure: coconut husk: rice bran at a ratio of 1:1:1:0.5; trt 3 consisted of rice husk: burnt rice husk: cow manure: coconut coir: soil at a ratio of 1:1:1:1:0.5; trt 4 consisted of topsoil: coconut coir: rice husk: cow manure at a ratio of 1:1:0.5:0.5, mixed with vermicompost at a ratio of 40:60; and trt 5 consisted of soil: coconut coir: rice husk: cow manure at a ratio of 0.5:0.5:1:1. The results showed that trt 2 was the most effective in promoting kale growth, as it produced the highest plant height, leaf area, shoot fresh and dry weights, and root dry weight of kale. For root fresh weight, trt 1 and 3 showed the highest values.