PHYSIOLOGICAL STUDIES ON THE DROUGHT TOLERANCE OF SOME FRUIT TRANSPLANTS

Abstract

The present investigation was carried out during 2000 and 2001 seasons and included two separate experiments at the Horticulture Research Station, Seds, Beni-Suef Governorate, to study the drought tolerance of some fruit transplants.

Uniform and hea1thy one-year old transplants namely olive "Olea europea, L.", c.v. Picual and pomegranate "P,mica granatum, L." c.v. Manfaloty as well as seedlings of one-year old namely Guava "Psidium guajava, L.", were the plant materials in this study. These plants were selected and planted individually in plastic pots of25 em diameter, filled with (6 kg) constant weight of loamy sand soil in I st half ofFebmary in both seasons. All pots were irrigated at constant rate (510 em/pot) to reach 100 % available water of soil at two days interval till mid-March (starting the experimental work) and these pots were fertilized with complex fertilizer "New Star" (2 g/liter) once every week during both seasons.

The First Experiment

It was conducted during two successive seasons to study the effect of four levels of irrigation on the three used fruit species in a completely randomized design. This experiment involved 12 treatments and each treatment was replicated 3 times, besides each replicate was represented by 5 transplants. The four irrigation levels were irrigation after 20, 40, 60 and

80% depletion of available water (A.W.).