Evaluación de la viabilidad de semillas en seis variedades de melón (cucumis melo l.) mediante pruebas de tetrazolio.

Abstract

The melon (Cucumis melo L.) is an important horticultural crop throughout the world due to its fruit, profitability and commercialization, whether in hot or temperate climates. In Ecuador, it is sown from December to March, covering an area of 924 hectares, with a yield of 7,549 tons, becoming a product of commercial value in the country, occupying the second place by area sown among cucurbits. In the agricultural sector, farmers depend, for the most part, on seeds as an input for multiplication, so its continuous and progressive development is important, and in many cases the seeds after their maturation and dispersal are not able to germinate, or else due to unfavorable external conditions, for which the seeds demand high quality. Given the importance of all these aspects, different protocols have been developed to evaluate the viability and vigor of the seeds, as well as to achieve storage conditions that ensure greater longevity. This research has the objective of evaluating the percentage of viability and germination in six varieties of melon by means of the tetrazolium test. An experimental design was carried out where 2 study factors (Ag3 and variety) were evaluated and the main variables to be measured were percentage of viability through the Tetrazolium test and Germination with the Ag3 test, however, more variables were taken with in order to see the behavior of the seedling in open ground conditions. Applying a normality test in this case Shapiro Wilk and bias boxes in turn, a regression was performed to obtain the correlation coefficient. In addition, a comparison of means was applied by means of an ANOVA to know which is significant and finally a multivariate linear model was applied to be able to obtain bar graphs to determine at which dose of Ag3 the best morpho-agronomic characteristics were presented with respect to the use of this hormone. Through the normality test, it was demonstrated that there is significance in the two study variables to be measured (Viability-Germination), so it is understood that the study fulfilled the assumptions of homogeneity of the variance. Graphically through the bias boxes it was confirmed again that there is significance in both variables, with respect to the regression, the correlation coefficient was positive, therefore the two variables are correlated in a direct sense. We can conclude that the six varieties are suitable for a subsequent sowing because they presented an optimal percentage of viability obtaining a range of 90 to 100% in varieties V1, V2, and V5, in varieties V3, V6 a range of 95- 100% and for the V4 variety it presented a range of 80-100% and in the germination test for the six varieties they presented means from 95 to 100%, thus demonstrating that the results obtained by the tetrazolium test are homogeneous. In relation to the germination test with different doses, it was shown that the use of 10 ml presented better agronomic characteristics than the other doses respectively.