Growth, gas exchange, and mineral nutrition of 'Wonderful' pomegranate irrigated with saline water

Youping Sun; Genhua Niu; Joseph G. Masabni; Youping Sun; Genhua Niu; Joseph G. Masabni

doi:10.48130/tihort-0023-0030

Figures (4) Tables (2)

Figure 1.
The electrical conductivity (EC) of the leachate collected from potted plants of 'Wonderful' pomegranate grown in a greenhouse and irrigated with a control nutrient solution (electrical conductivity (EC) = 1.2 dS·m⁻¹, CNT) or one of two saline solutions (EC = 5.0 (EC 5) or 10.0 dS·m⁻¹ (EC 10)). Vertical bars represent standard deviations of six samples per treatment.
Figure 2.
Concentration of Na, Cl, Ca, and K in the leaves, stems, and roots of 'Wonderful' pomegranate grown in a greenhouse and irrigated with a control nutrient solution (electrical conductivity (EC) = 1.2 dS·m⁻¹, CNT) or one of two saline solutions (EC = 5.0 (EC 5) or 10.0 dS·m⁻¹ (EC 10)). The same lowercase letters above the error bars indicate the treatments are not significantly different based on Tukey's honest significant difference (HSD) test at α = 0.05.
Figure 3.
Concentration of P, Mg, Fe, and S in the leaves, stems, and roots of 'Wonderful' pomegranate grown in a greenhouse and irrigated with a control nutrient solution (electrical conductivity (EC) = 1.2 dS·m⁻¹, CNT) or one of two saline solutions (EC = 5.0 (EC 5) or 10.0 dS·m⁻¹ (EC 10)). The same lowercase letters above the error bars indicate the treatments are not significantly different based on Tukey's honest significant difference (HSD) test at α = 0.05.
Figure 4.
Concentration of Zn, Cu, Mn, and B in the leaves, stems, and roots of 'Wonderful' pomegranate grown in a greenhouse and irrigated with a control nutrient solution (electrical conductivity (EC) = 1.2 dS·m⁻¹, CNT) or one of two saline solutions (EC = 5.0 (EC 5) or 10.0 dS·m⁻¹ (EC 10)). The same lowercase letters above the error bars indicate the treatments are not significantly different based on Tukey's honest significant difference (HSD) test at α = 0.05.

	Treatment	Foliar damage*	Height (cm)	Leaf DW (g)	Stem DW (g)	Shoot DW (g)	Root DW (g)
First harvest	Control	5.0 a**	84.7 a	40.3 a	32.3 a	72.6 a	−***
	EC 5	4.8 a	84.3 a	38.5 ab	31.6 a	70.1 a	−
	EC 10	5.0 a	77.1 b	33.1 b	28.7 a	61.8 b	−
Second harvest	Control	5.0 a	68.3 a	25.6 a	26.5 a	52.1 a	25.3 a
	EC 5	4.7 b	69.6 a	24.1 ab	21.3 b	45.4 b	24.6 a
	EC 10	4.9 ab	65.2 a	19.4 b	16.5 c	35.9 c	20.3 a
* Visual damage was rated using a reference scale from 0 to 5, where 0 = dead; 1 = over 90% foliar damage (salt damage: leaf burn, necrosis, or discoloration); 2 = moderate (50% to 90%) foliar damage; 3 = slight (less than 50%) foliar damage; 4 = good quality with minimal foliar damage; and 5 = excellent without foliar damage^[17]. Means with the same letters within the column and harvest date are not significantly different among treatments by Tukey's honest significant difference (HSD) multiple comparisons at α = 0.05. * Data for the first harvest was not collected in the first harvest because the plants continued to grow for the second round of treatments.

Table 1.

Foliar damage, plant height, and leaf, stem, and shoot dry weight (DW) of 'Wonderful' pomegranate grown in a greenhouse and irrigated with a control nutrient solution (electrical conductivity (EC) = 1.2 dS·m⁻¹) or one of two saline solutions (EC = 5.0 (EC 5) or 10.0 dS·m⁻¹ (EC 10)).

	Treatment	SPAD	F_v/F_m	P_n (µmol·m⁻²·s⁻¹)	E (mmol·m⁻²·s⁻¹)	g_s (mmol·m⁻²·s⁻¹)
First harvest	Control	54.3 a*	0.79 a	10.6 a	4.1 a	250 a
	EC 5	52.9 a	0.80 a	12.8 a	4.3 a	277 a
	EC 10	54.4 a	0.80 a	12.1 a	4.1 a	273 a
Second harvest	Control	44.3 a	0.79 a	15.6 ab	4.8 a	421 a
	EC 5	42.2 ab	0.79 a	16.3 a	4.8 a	403 a
	EC 10	39.9 b	0.80 a	13.6 b	4.2 a	321 a
* Means with the same lowercase letters within the column and harvest date are not significantly different among treatments by Tukey's honest significant difference (HSD) multiple comparison at α = 0.05.

Table 2.

SPAD meter readings, maximum photochemical efficiency (F_v/F_m) of photosystem II, net photosynthesis (P_n), transpiration (E), and stomatal conductance (g_s) of 'Wonderful' pomegranate grown in a greenhouse and irrigated with a control nutrient solution (electrical conductivity (EC) = 1.2 dS·m⁻¹) or one of two saline solutions (EC = 5.0 (EC 5) or 10.0 dS·m⁻¹ (EC 10)).