Abstract

CASIERRA-POSADA, Fánor; ARIAS-AGUIRRE, Julio A.  and  PACHON, César A.. Effect of salinity caused by NaCl on hybrid tomato plants (Lycopersicon esculentum Miller). Orinoquia [online]. 2013, vol.17, n.1, pp.23-29. ISSN 0121-3709.

Soil salinity represents one of the greatest abiotic environmental stresses affecting tomato production around the world. Colombian tomato production has been affected by this problem in the Alto Ricaurte region of the Boyacá department due to fertilisers having been applied via fertigation, leading to long-term negative consequences, particularly salt accumulation. A bi-factor study was carried out in greenhouse conditions near Tunja, Boyacá, for investigating the comparative tolerance capacity of four tomato hybrids exposed to increasing salinity levels. Supermagnate, Astona, Marimba and Gloria hybrid tomato seedlings were sown in 3.5 kg pots containing soil. They were exposed to 0, 20, 40, 60 and/or 80 mmol NaCl. These treatments' electrical conductivity was 1.8, 3.6, 5.2, 7.2 and 8.8dS m^-1, respectively. Water consumption, water-use efficiency (WUE), dry weight and leaf area were determined. There sults revealed statistically significant differences between hybrid sand salinity level; however, there were no differences regarding hybrid interaction x salinity. The Astona hybrid had the highest WUE value, leaf area and dry mass production whilst Marimba had the lowest WUE and dry mass value. Water consumption, WUE, total dry weight and leaf area were most severely affected when salinity was above 40 mmol NaCl. The region's tomato growers should take precautions for limiting such effects when growing these hybrids due to the salinity response of the hybrids evaluated here and should also evaluate salinity tolerance in other vegetable materials.

Keywords : water consumption; leaf area; water-use efficiency; osmotic stress.

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