Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
The integrated use of plant density and fertilizer (cow manure) in-
creased the percentage of essential oil to 6.18% in 25 plants per square
meter and the essential oil yield to 20.19 kg/ha in 25 plants per square
meter (Table 2). The application of organic fertilizer did not indicate any
signifi cant effect on the essential oil, but its interaction with plant den-
sity showed a signifi cant (p<0.01) difference. Choosing an optimum plant
density and fertilizer may improve soil physical and chemical properties,
nutrient availability that might increase the quality of yield. It was also ob-
served that at the same oil yield level of essential oil of
Artemisia annua
,
increased 1.5, 2 and 2.5 fold when the plant densities increased about 2, 4,
and 8 fold (Ram et al., 1997).
Khorshidi (2009) in his research on Foeniculum vulgare Mill. var.
“Soroksary” reported that the highest essential oil percentage (3.53%)
was obtained when applying the lowest densities of planting. The high-
est percentage of anethole (83.07%), estragol (3.47%), fenchone (8.04%),
p-cymene (4.45%), α-terpinene (0.54%), sabinene (0.51%), and α-pinene
(0.48%) were obtained with the space between plants of 25, 10, 20, 20, 15,
20, and 25 cm, respectively.
The yield and essential oil of aniseed are affected by the genotype, the
ecological conditions and especially by agricultural practices, such as the
sowing date, fertilizer and water application, and plant density (Nabizadeh
et al., 2012).
8.4 CONCLUSION
The highest yields of seeds and essential oil of anise were obtained from
the application of vermicompost and optimum plant density of 25 and 50
plants per square meter. Seedlings grown at the highest planting density
(50 plants/m
2
) and treated with vermicompost (5 t/ha) had better devel-
opment than all groups without vermicompost, even at the lowest den-
sity. The application of organic fertilizers has great potential to acceler-
ate growth development and increase germination, growth, flowering and
fruit production when applying an optimum plant density.
