Rooting of semi-hardwood blueberry mini-cuttings from different cultivars from the highbush and rabbiteye groups

Abstract

The objective of this work was to evaluate the rooting of semi-hardwood blueberry minicuttings, from different cultivars and groups, from the Highbush and Rabbiteye groups in the same culture medium. The experiment was carried out in an agricultural greenhouse in a commercial nursery whith semi-hardwood mini-cuttings were used. The work was conducted, with cuttings segmented into mini-cuttings with three gems and an average diameter of 1.5 mm. Subsequently, their bases were immersed, for 10 seconds, in a commercial solution of IBA, in the concentration of 2.000 mg.L-1, with a mixture of coarse-grained sand and commercial substrate in the proportion of 1:1 as a substrate. The Bifactorial experimental design used was in completely randomized blocks, with two groups (highbush and rabbiteye) and six cultivars (Georgiagem, Misty, O'Neal, Bluegem, Powderblue and Woodard), with four replications and ten cuttings per plot. The percentage of rooted cuttings and surviving cuttings, average number of roots and shoots per cuttings, length of the largest root and shoot, were evaluated. It was found that, in general, the rabbiteye group was superior when compared to the highbush group. Blueberry cultivars from the rabbiteye group when propagated by semi-hardwood cuttings, have greater rooting facility than cultivars from the highbush group. The rooting potential between the cultivars in blueberry studied was different, allow the formation of 95% of cuttings rooted in 90 days.