Authors
Abstract
Basil (Ocimumbasilicum L.) is one of the important plants belonging to the genus
family Lamiaceae (Labiatae), which is used as herbs, spices, and as well as fresh
vegetables. The present study was conducted to investigate the interaction of
deficit irrigation, soil texture, and fertilization on yield components and vegetative
growth of basil variety Keshkeniluvelou, using a factorial experiment based on
randomized complete block design (RCBD) with 18 treatments and 3 replications.
Deficit irrigation treatments consisted of three levels of irrigation including
I1=100%, I2=75%, and I3=50% of ETc, and soil texture included sandy loam and
loamy soil. Also, 3 fertilizer treatments with 100 percent of the recommended rate
(including macro- and micronutrients) (F1), 70 percent (F2), and no fertilizer (F3)
were applied to each pot. The ANOVA results showed that effect of irrigation was
significant, soil texture and fertilizer were not significant, and interaction of soil
texture and fertilizer were significant on plant height, leaf area , leaf dry weight,
stem dry weight, and fresh weight of basil, respectively. The tallest plant height
(31.42cm), leaf area (109.21cm2), leaf dry weight (0.97 gr), stem dry weight
(2.24 gr), and fresh weight of leaf (5.12gr) was obtained in S1I1F3 treatment and
the lowest in the S1I3F3 treatment. Also, the highest seed weight per plant
(2.41gr), number of seeds per plant (1822.3), thousand seed weight (1.447gr), and
seed yield (42.13 gr/m2) were obtained in the treatment having loamy soil texture,
full irrigation, and 100% of the recommended fertilizer rate (S2I1F1), which
showed the effect of fertilizer on improving the yield of basil.
Keywords
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