Studies on effectiveness of plant growth retardants in retarding the growth of ornamental foliage plants

Abstract

A pot culture study was undertaken at Floricultural Research Station, Rajendranagar, Hyderabad for two years during 2012-13 and 2013-14 to study the effect of growth retardants on growth and suitability of two ornamental foliage plants i.e Aglaonema Cv Ernesto’s Favourite and Schefflera arboricola ‘Trinetta’. During first year with the application of paclobutrazol @ 0.25 mg/pot the increase in plant height was drastically restricted to 1.18 cm and 1.91 cm in Aglaonema and Schefflera respectively. While in long run i.e at the end of second year ancymidol @ 1.00 mg/pot was found effective in restricting the plant height to 56.16 cm and 43.00 cm in Aglaonema and Scheffelera respectively. During second year, in Aglaonema, the soil drench with ancymidol
@ 1.00 mg/pot was found effective in significantly retarding the growth of the plant with minimum number of leaves (8.66), leaf length (20.66cm), width (7.50 cm), petiole length (8.09 cm) and stem diameter (1.23 cm). While in Schefflera, paclobutrazol @ 0.25 mg/pot showed good response in retarding all the growth characters which was on par with ancymidol @ 1.00 mg/pot.