EFFECT OF MALEIC HYDRAZIDE ON FLORAL AND VEGETATIVE DEVELOPMENT OF SAINTPAULIA IONANTHA

P. Lemattre
The early flowering of Saintpaulia generally has no commercial quality and it is often necessary to remove it by hand. To suppress this tedious and expensive work the action of the most important growth regulators was investigated (1,2). In this first trial only Maleic Hydrazide gave results: first flowers were inhibited and the development of vegetative ax axillary buds was induced (fig.1,2). These axyllary shoots, cut off the mother plant could be rooted and use as propagating material.

The optimal dosage of Maleic Hydrazide varies from I to 2% according to the cultivar (table 1).

Additional studies were carried out to determine the origin of these lateral buds.

Table 1 - Average number of vegetative buds of cultivars of Saintpaulia sprayed with Meleic Hydrazide.

Cultivars Control 0.1% 0.15% 0.2%

Rhapsodie        
2 000       0 10.0 7.8 5.6
2 000       0.1 4.7 7.0 17.6
2 738       0.2 11.3 5.4 1.4
Lemattre, P. (1977). EFFECT OF MALEIC HYDRAZIDE ON FLORAL AND VEGETATIVE DEVELOPMENT OF SAINTPAULIA IONANTHA. Acta Hortic. 68, 185-188
DOI: 10.17660/ActaHortic.1977.68.23
https://doi.org/10.17660/ActaHortic.1977.68.23

Acta Horticulturae