Acta Scientiarum: Animal Sciences (Jul 2006)
Avaliação de características fisiológicas de cinco cultivares de Cynodon = Evaluation of physiological characteristics in five Cynodon cultivars
Abstract
O experimento foi conduzido na Faculdade de Ciências Agrárias e Veterinárias, Unesp, Campus de Jaboticabal, Estado de São Paulo. Os tratamentos consistiram na avaliação de cinco cultivares de Cynodon, em onze idades de corte, para estudo das características fisiológicas. O delineamento estatístico adotado foi o inteiramente casualizado em parcelas subdivididas, com três repetições, considerando-se nas parcelas os cultivares (C) e nas subparcelas as idades de corte (I). Foram avaliadas a taxa de crescimento relativo (TCR), o índice de área foliar (IAF), a razão de peso foliar (RPF) e teor de clorofila. A TCR foi semelhante entre os cultivares, variando com a idade das plantas. Os cultivares Florona, Florakirk e Tifton 68 apresentaram os maiores valores médios de área foliar, sendo que oTifton 68 proporcionou o mais elevado IAF (PThe experiment was carried out at Ciências Agrárias e Veterinárias Faculty, UNESP, Jaboticabal, São Paulo State, in order to evaluate five Cynodon cultivars. The plants, sampled once a week, were from 14 to 84 days, and the study focused on their physiological characteristics. A random design with split plot was adopted with three replications, considering cultivars as plot and cutting age as split plot. The following variables were studied: relative growth rate, specific leaf area, LAI, leaf weight/total dry matter ratio and chlorophyll contents. The relative growth rates were similar for the five cultivars studied, varying with the age of the plants. The cultivar Tifton 85 showed the highest values for leaf weight/total dry matter ratio and leaf area. The cultivars Tifton 68, Tifton 85 and Florico showed the highest LAI and values did not differ among each other. Chlorophyll content did not limit plant growth. Dataobtained allowed us to conclude that the five cultivars would be better managed during 28 days of plant growth.
