Production Potential of Solanaceous Vegetables in Hydroponic System

Abstract

Tomato and bell Pepper are the most important solanaceous vegetables grown widely all over the world. Now-a-days different vegetables especially tomato and lettuce are starting to grow hydroponically in Bangladesh. Use of sawdust as a hydroponic growing medium is a new concept and practiced in many countries of the world. However, there is little or no information of growing solanaceous vegetables in sawdust medium in Bangladesh. In the study, the effect of the use of sawdust as a growth medium on growth and yield of tomato and bell pepper was evaluated against the use of soil medium. The result of this study showed that all the growth parameters (percent survival, plant height, number of leaves, leaf length and leaf width, and number of fruits) in sawdust medium were delayed and less in number as compared to those planted on the soil. The highest germination percentage (tomato: 99.69%; bell pepper: 98.42%) were obtained from both the vegetables germinated with soil compared to cocopeat and sawdust. The plant height (tomato: 99.89cm; bell pepper: 18.63), leaf length and leaf width (tomato: 32.58cm; 8.20cm; bell pepper: 25.91cm; 8.58cm respectively), number of fruit plant-1 (tomato: 44.33; bell pepper: 6.67), of tomato and bell pepper were highest in soil compare to sawdust. However, sawdust is relatively inexpensive and readily available material for use in hydroponic culture. Therefore, sawdust can be used as an alternative growth medium in planting solanaceous vegetables for commercial production of the vegetables and need further studies on the use of mixture of sawdust and soil media for growing vegetables hydroponically.