CUCUMBER YIELD AND COMPONENTS AS INFLUENCED BY K – SULPHATE AND K – CHLORIDE UNDER CONTROLLED ENVIROMENT AND DRIP IRRIGATION

Abstract

A Field experiment was conducted at fall season of 2003/2004 under heated plastic house conditions and drip irrigation at AL-Yousifiya district situated 24 km south of Baghdad in a silty clay loam texture soil (Typic Torrifluvent) , classified as (MM4) (at the series Level) to compare the effect of potassium sulphate (41% K) and potassium chloride (50% K) on yield and its components of cucumber (Cucumis sativus L.) , cv. Shoa'a by six levels of both K - sulphate and K – chloride (0, 100, 125, 250, 500 and 1000 kg K.ha-1 and 1000 kg N.ha-1 as urea 46% N and 78 kg P.ha-1 as super phosphate (20%P) were used. Randomized Complete Block Design was used with three replicates . Results showed that the potassium sulphate fertilizer had significant effect for all studied characteristics (total yield , plant yield , number of fruit and the weight of fruit) compared with potassium chloride . The level of 1000 kg K.ha-1 of both potassium fertilizers had significant effect compared with the level of 500 kg K.ha-1 . The level of 1000 kg K.ha-1 gave the highest effect for all above mentioned characteristics and gave 130.66 and 128.92 ton.ha-1 of total yield for potassium sulphate and potassium chloride respectively and gave 5.23 and 5.16 kg fruit.plant-1 for potassium sulphate and potassium chloride respectively . For number of fruit the same level gave 61.62 and 60.24 fruit.plant-1 for potassium sulphate and potassium chloride respectively . The same level gave the highest fruit weight that were 85.67 and 83.60 gm.plant-1 for potassium sulphate and potassium chloride respectively . Results also showed, that the economical evaluation indicated that the level of 1000 kg K.ha-1 of both K – sources was superior than the level of 500 kg K.ha-1 of both K – sources, but the level of 1000 kg K.ha-1 of KCl had more benefits than the same level of K2SO4. Therefore the KCl fertilizer can be as a good substituent source of potassium instead of K2SO4 for cucumber especially at the application of high levels of potassium fertilizers under the condition of the experiment.