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Projects

Effect of Plant Stem Density on Tomato Yield

Status: Finished

Year: 2023

Project type Effect of Plant Stem Density on Tomato Yield

Background

In the greenhouse, the solar light is converted to a marketable vegetable product. For this, the plants will have to intercept the solar light, and the more plants, the more light will be intercepted. But, standing next to each other, the plants also compete for light, which makes that after a certain plant density.

Experiment History

Seed Sowing: 21 June 2018
Variety: Tone Guitar
Transplanting: 17 July 2018
Plant density: 2.5 plants per m², stem density differences by keeping additional stems
Harvesting period: 5 September 2018 – 13 April 2019 (32 weeks)

Goals

Study the difference between three stem densities in tomato production.

The main factors studied are:

Three different stem densities: 3.75, 5, and 6.25 stems/m²

Result overview

The optimum stem density is 5 stems/m²

Stem Density	H1	H2	H3	Average
3.75 stems/m²	26.2 kg/m²	29.2 kg/m²	39.2 kg/m²	31.5 kg/m²
5 stems/m²	29.9 kg/m²	36.4 kg/m²	40.8 kg/m²	35.7 kg/m²
6.25 stems/m²	31.5 kg/m²	35.2 kg/m²	37.4 kg/m²	34.7 kg/m²

Recommendation

Tomato-growing goes best when the stem density is around 5 stems/m²
This stem density was achieved by a plant density of 2.5 plants per m² (plants 25 cm separated in the line, with lines at 1.6 meters in between)
Further increase of density doesn’t give the extra yield.

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