Electronic Journal of Biology

The Effect of Swoing Date, Planting Density and Bio-fertilizers on the Essential Oil Content of Dragonhead (Dracocephalum moldavica L.) in Sari Climatic Condition

Dragonhead (Dracocephalum moldavica L.) is an annual, herbaceous plant belongs the family Lamiaceae. Dragonhead has some therapeutic properties such assedative, tonic, antimicrobial. In order to study the effects of sowing date, density and bio-fertilizers on essential oil content and some morphological characteristics of dragonhead, a field experiment was conducted in Sari Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources university by using of split-plot design in the base of randomized complete blocks with three replications in 2011. Which has been in three sowing dates (12 of June, 5 of July and 17 of July) as main factors, three planting density levels (30 × 10, 30 × 20 and 30 × 30 cm) and bio-fertilizer levels on two surfaces including (Humiforte biofertilizer and non biofertilizer). The results of the analysis of variance indicated that sowing date had significant effect on plant height, oil percentage and oil yield but planting density had significant effect only on the fresh herbage and dry herbage also bio-fertilizer had no significant effect on the parameters of research. Results of mean comparisons revealed that the highest fresh herbage weight (7374.7 kg) and the highest oil yield (1.197 kg) were obtained at the second sowing date (July 5). The highest dry herbage weight (2007 kg) was obtained at the third sowing date (July 17) and the highest oil content (0.065 %) was obtained at the first sowing date (June 12). Results of mean comparisons revealed that the highest fresh herbage weight (8260.2 kg), the highest dry herbage weight (2787.5 kg) and the highest oil yield (1.53 kg) were obtained at the planting density (10 cm) but the highest oil content (0.058 %) was obtained at the planting density (30 cm). In general according to survey results can determine June 12 as sowing dates and 30 cm as the density and lack of bio-fertilizers for dragonhead herb according to weather conditions of Sari city of Mazandaran province

Author(s): Seyyed Hossein Hashemian Ahmadi, Amin Hadipanah

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