ROOT DEATH IN CUCUMBER UNDER DIFFERENT COMPETITIVE CONDITIONS OF THE ROOTS

Root death in cucumbers at the onset of harvesting may be caused by competition for assimilates between fruits and roots.
The experiments were carried out in NFT.

Root death was prevented in most cases by replacing the root system with that of Cucurbita ficifolia. Grafting on other cucumber cultivars did not prevent root death in ‘Farbio’. Next, the size of the root mat was ½ – 1 or 2 x that of the control.
Roots were pruned either at planting or when the plants were flowering.
The size of the root mat at the time of root death was not significantly different for the treatments.
However, weakened plants took longer time to recover from root death.

Topping at flowering (-T) and deflowering (-F) treatments were combined (control = +T+F). Plants with fruits took longer time to recover from root death than plants without fruits.
The root mat was significantly larger in plants without fruits.
In none of the experiments root death was prevented completely.
Therefore, root death is not merely caused by competition for assimilates.

Symposium on Nutrition, Growing Techniques and Plant Substrates

J. L.F. van der Vlugt

https://doi.org/10.17660/ActaHortic.1986.178.15