YIELD RESPONSE OF GLOBE ARTICHOKE CV. ROMANESCO TO PLANT DENSITY

The clone C3 of cultivar Romanesco obtained by in vitro micropropagation recently became available to Italian globe artichoke producers.
The new type is sufficiently different from traditional cv.
Romanesco in plant form, earliness and other characteristics.
The information on this plant type with regard to different cultural practices is limited.
The purpose of this experiment was to evaluate the effect of in-row spacing of plantlets on early and total yield and head weight.
In addition, the “plant density x plant age” interaction was studied.
Field studies were conducted at Piana di Gela (Sicily – Italy) during 2000/2001, 2001/2002 growing seasons and involved 4 plant spacings and 2 plant ages (1 or 2 year old). In-row plantlet spacings were 0.5 – 0.8 – 1.1 – 1.4 m in-rows spaced 1.5 m.
Early and total yield (as number of heads) per individual plant increased linearly and quadratically with increasing within-row spacing.
On the contrary, total number of heads m^-1, in general, increasing linearly or linearly and quadratically with decreasing in-row spacing.
The weight of the main head was always unaffected by in–row spacing.

V International Congress on Artichoke

G. Santoiemma, A. Ierna, N. Morello, P. Licandro, G. Mauromicale

in-row spacing, earliness, head weight, plant age

https://doi.org/10.17660/ActaHortic.2004.660.67