GROWTH, YIELD AND WATER USE EFFICIENCY OF TOMATO (Lycopersicum esculentum Mill) USING DRIP IRRIGATION IN AKURE, NIGERIA.

Abstract

Experiment was conducted at the Department of Agricultural Engineering Farm land of the Federal University of Technology, Akure, during January- April, 2013/2014 dry season to investigate the response of two different cultivars of tomato under drip irrigation. The treatments were based on four different water regimes; with T1 receiving 100% available water (AW) as control while T2 , T3 and T4 received 75%, 50% and 25% of AW respectively. Local cultivar of tomato called Pyriforme Alef- pear (tomato from Kano) and the hybrid cultivar called Roma tomato were planted at a spacing of 0.5 m by 0.4 m. The results indicated that T1, full treatment for hybrid cultivar produced the highest fruit yield of 12.10 ton/ha and T2, low water regime treatment for local cultivar produced lowest fruit yield of 7.82 ton/ha in the cropping season respectively. However, the total water use of 376.70 mm was recorded for T1, 351.74 mm for T2 and 326.78 mm for T3 and 301.66 mm for T4 respectively. The water use efficiency determined for the two cultivars of tomato planted in the cropping season ranged between 26.7 - 32.3 kg/ha/mm for local cultivar and 30.8 - 35.2 kg/ha/mm for the hybrid cultivar of tomato respectively. The predicted values for yield under polynomial and linear functions showed that local tomato (r = 1) gave a better yield prediction than hybrid cultivar (r = 0.6).