Effect of container type and size on the growth and quality of seedlings of Indian sandalwood (Santalum album L.)

Summary

Studies were carried out to determine the effects of container type and size on the growth and quality of seedlings of Indian sandalwood (Santalum album L.), an over-exploited hemi-root parasite. Three types of container, viz. root trainers (150,270,300, 450 and 600 mL), polythene bags (polybags) (600, 1000 and 1500 mL) and plastic containers (1000 mL) were used with a potting medium that consisted of sand, soil, compost, burnt rice husk and charcoal in the ratio of 5:3:10:1:1. Cajanus cajan was used as a primary host in all treatments.

Survival and overall growth of sandalwood seedlings 6 mo old, in terms of height, collar diameter, seedling biomass and root-shoot ratio, were best in root trainers, and next best in plastic containers. Among the root trainers, the 600 mL size was optimum for most of the parameters of seedling quality, including height (20.4 cm), total dry weight (3.06 g), shoot dry weight (1.66 g), root dry weight (1.41 g) and quality index (0.37). This size was followed by the 270 and 300 mL root trainers. Despite the large size of the polybags (600–1500 mL), seedling growth in these was poor. Root coiling and poor root development affected root dry weight (0.13–0.39 g) and the quality index (0.03–0.05).

Good quality seedlings >20 cm high, >3.0 mm in collar diameter and with an 0.3 quality index can be produced in 6 mo in 600 mL root trainers. Most of the parameters of seedling quality (seedling height, collar diameter, seedling biomass and quality index) of seedlings grown in 270 mL block-type root trainers were comparable with those of seedlings in 1000 mL plastic containers. This result encourages further reduction in container size from 600 mL to 270 mL by better managing nutrition and screening for better primary hosts.

Keywords:

• seedling growth
• quality
• containers
• container grown plants
• planting stock
• Santalum album
• Cajanus cajan