Efecto de la fertilización edáfica nitrogenada y potásica en parámetros agronómicos del cultivo de banano (musa x paradisiaca.) clon williams

Abstract

The experiment was conducted at the Santa Inés Experimental Farm of the Faculty of Agricultural Sciences at the Technical University of Machala, located on the Machala-Pasaje road at Km 5.5. Bananas represent the fourth most important crop. In 2016 Ecuador exported 6'176,219 MT, it is the first exporter of bananas worldwide with 30% of the world market, and the fourth producer in the world of this fruit. Despite the fact that the country is the first exporter of bananas, the average yield of the fruit per hectare is below that obtained in other producing countries such as Costa Rica, Colombia, Panama, etc. The banana crop has been presenting problems related to nutritional complications, which generates a low yield and usefulness of the plants. Consequently, it originates a low competitiveness for the foreign market. The objective of this research was to analyze the effects of the interaction of increasing doses of N and K on vegetative growth variables of the cultivar Williams, in the province of El Oro, Ecuador. A completely randomized block design (CSBD) was implemented with 16 treatments and four replications, in a 4 x 4 factorial scheme. Each factor has 4 levels, being element 1 Nitrogen (N) and its levels N1 (0 kilogram of N), N2 (200 kilogram of N), N3 (400 kilogram of N) and N4 (600 kilogram of N). Potassium (K) component 2 and its levels K1 (0 kilogram of K), N2 (375 kilogram of K), K3 (750 kilogram of K) and K4 (1125 kilogram of K), the ratio of these 2 components and their levels resulted in 16 treatments: T1 (N1K1), T2 (N1K2), T3 (N1K3), T4 (N1K4), T5 (N2K1), T6 (N2K2), T7 (N2K3), T8 (N2K4), T9 (N3K1), T10 (N3K2), T11 (N3K3), T12 (N3K4), T13 (N4K1), T14 (N4K2), T15 (N4K3), T16 (N4K4) The experimental area is 0.86 Hectares, the plants were distributed in a spacing of 1.7m between plants and 2.2m between rows. On the day of sowing (dds), 6 plants were randomly selected from the 16 plants of each empirical unit, which were followed up to the phase concept. The variables evaluated in this experiment were: 1) plant height (PA), 2) leaf emission (FE), 3) leaf area (LA), 4) weeks to flowering (WF) and 5) weeks to harvest (WH). Nitrogen had an incidence in all the study variables, highlighting the dose of 600 kg/Ha/year in the variables height, emission and leaf area with values of 2,36 m, 1,031 and 30.44 respectively, mainly due to the importance of nitrogen in the synthesis of proteins, therefore, it plays an important role in the vegetative growth of the plant. In the variable weeks to flowering, the doses of 400 and 200 kg/Ha/year stood out with 29 and 29,13 weeks respectively, and in weeks to harvest the doses of 400, 200 and 600 kg/Ha/year did not present significant differences with values of 43,4, 43,71 and 45,01 weeks respectively, shortening the time in comparison with the dose 0 kg/Ha/year that reached a time in weeks of 52,72 weeks to harvest. Regarding the incidence of the potassium-nitrogen interaction on the response variables, there were statistical differences in the variable weeks to flowering, where the potassium and nitrogen interactions at doses of 400 kg N - 375 kg K, 600 kg N - 0 kg K, 200 kg N - 1125 kg K with values of 28,20, 28,47 and 28,65 weeks, respectively, stand out with the shortest time in weeks.