INTENSIVE PRODUCTION OF CACTUS PEARITOS UNDER PLASTIC TUNNELS

Cactus pearitos have a high demand as human food in México.
So it is important to supply the market along all the year and it is possible by producing cactus pearitos under intensive systems.
One of such systems is under plastic tunnels.
Thus, an experiment was carried out during 1997 in the experimental field of the Centro Regional Universitario Centro Norte of the Universidad Autónoma Chapingo, which is located near Zacatecas City.
Four varieties of Opuntia ficus-indica (‘Copena V1’, ‘Copena F1’, ‘Villanueva’ and ‘Jalpa’) were arranged in three blocks (plastic tunnels). Blocks (10 x 2 m; 12 m²) were nine rows and six columns, so there were 54 (3 m²) mother cladodes of each variety within each block.
Measurements were taken to determine cactus pearitos biomass produced along the year.
Registered annual yields were as follows: 262.63, 238.04, 210.03 and 179.22 ton ha^-1 for ‘Copena V1’, ‘Villanueva’, ‘Jalpa’ and ‘Copena F1’, respectively.
This results suggest ‘Copena V1’ and ‘Villanueva’ are the varieties with better adaptation to plastic tunnel system.

IV International Congress on Cactus Pear and Cochineal

F. Blanco-Macías, R.D. Valdez-Cepeda, R.R. Ruiz-Garduño

Opuntia ficus-indica, Annual mean yield, Commercial varieties

https://doi.org/10.17660/ActaHortic.2002.581.32