Production and chemical composition of forage palm micropropagated in vitro

Abstract

We evaluated the relationship between the size of seedlings, production and chemical composition of forage palm cv. Giant micropropagated in vitro. The experiment was conducted at the Forage Department of Animal Science, UFC, Fortaleza, Ceará, in soils with sand texture. We used the experimental design of randomized blocks with three treatments (seedlings with 10-20, 20-30 and bigger than 30cm) and four replications. The spacing used was a semi-dense (1.0m between rows and 0.5m between plants), and experimental plots of area equal to 3.5 x 1.5m, with four plants per plot. After two years of planting, the plants were cut at the height of the lower secondary racket, which we evaluated the production and chemical composition of cladodes of forage palm. Samples were removed, brought to the Animal Nutrition Laboratory to perform the analysis. In seedlings with greater than 30cm there was a production of 102.6_t/ha of green mass, which differed at a significance level of 5% of treatments 10-20cm and 20-30cm, with values of 53, 4 and 53.2t/ha, respectively. There was no significant difference at 5% significance by Student t test for chemical composition. We conclude that the forage palm seedlings should be transplanted to bigger than 30cm, but the size of the changes did not affect the chemical composition of forage palm.