Effect of silicon and gibberellic acid on growth and flowering of gladiolus

Abstract

Gladiolus grandiflorus is known and grown for its high profit and excellent cut flower. To compete with other growers and to meet the consumer demand the grower should adopt new techniques and apply effective chemicals to the plant precisely which in result gives good quality flowers. For this an experiment was carried out on Gladiolus grandiflorus cv. Rose supreme in experimental area of department of horticulture, Bahauddin Zakariya University, Multan. There were 6 treatments and 3 replications and the corms were planted in pots. Each treatment in replications is replicated four times to get best results. The sowing was done on 3rd December 2018 and the first application of chemicals was applied on 15/02/2019. The total number of applications was 6 and each application was applied by foliar application after one week interval. The chemicals were silicon and gibberellic acid. Silicon is applied as T0 (0g), T1 (1g), T2 (2g), T3 (3g), T4 (4g) and T5 (5g) while gibberellic acid has a fixed dose of 200ppm in each treatment. The best results related to vegetative and floral parameters were observed in T4 treatment plants which showed best result and an increase in stalk length, spike length, diameter of floret, diameter of spike, number of leaves per plant, vase life, number of florets per spike, fresh weight of complete flower stalk and plant height.