Zantedeschia

Ms Saryu Trivedi.
Ph.D. Scholar,
Department of Floriculture and Landscape Architecture,
ASPEE College of Horticulture, Navsari Agricultural University

Ms Tejal Patel
Ph.D. Scholar,
Department of Floriculture and Landscape Architecture,
ASPEE College of Horticulture, Navsari Agricultural University

Ms Mallika Sindha
Ph.D. Scholar,
Department of Floriculture and Landscape Architecture,
ASPEE College of Horticulture, Navsari Agricultural University

 

1.Introduction:

The flower is popular in mono bouquets, mixed bouquets and as single flower in a vase and are also used in bridal bouquets. Zantedeschia flowers are conspicuous for their shape, colour and exceptionally long vase life and can be transported 3 to 4 days without water. Zantedeschia is now in the Top 20 of cut flowers at Dutch flower auctions, with more than 70 million stems being sold per year.

Scientific Name: Zantedeschia sp. Family- Araceae

Origin- South Africa

2. Climate: Zantedeschia requires mild climate for its growth and
   1. Temperature: Best growth can be obtained under low temperature as plants develop less luxuriantly and become tougher. The required temperature range is in between 15o to 24oC (Day temperature 18o to 24oC, whereas night temperature 15o to 18oC). Lower temperature is preferred during flowering as it promotes more intense colour in the flowers, especially in pink and orange colour High temperature must be avoided after flowering, during tuber growth.
   2. Relative humidity: It can grow well under 60 to 75 per cent relative humidity.
   3. Light intensity: Light is a very important factor in the cultivation of Zantedeschia as it has influence on flower production per bulb. It is also important for bright colour of flowers and height of the plant. Too many screens or low light intensity will decrease the flower production as well as paler flowers. The average light intensity is around 40000
3. Soil: The soil used for Zantedeschia cultivation should have good structure as well as drainage facility. Sandy loam or clay loam soil is most suitable for cultivation of zantedeschia. Soil should have pH in between 6.1 to 6.5 and EC should be less than 1mS/cm. It is also important the soil should be free from primary fungus such as a Pythium or Soil should get sterilized with H2O2.
4. Bed preparation and layout: For zantedeschia beds material required and it’s proportion is given below,

Material	Clay soil	Silty loam soil
Red/Alluvial Soil	55%	60%
Sand	15%	10%
Vermicompost	30%	30%

 

Vermicompost and sand is added to enrich with organic matter and to improve the soil structure, respectively.

At the time of bed preparation following basal dose is added,

• Single super phosphate: 2kg/100m2
• Calcium nitrate: 3kg/100m2
• Magnesium sulphate: 300g/100m2

All these material is mixed thoroughly. Beds of width of 1m and height of 35cm are prepared. The distance between two beds should be 30cm.

05. Planting: In green house, planting can be done at any time of the Tubers above 12cm circumference are used for flowering. Always be sure that the tubers have undergone at least 10 to 11 weeks of dormancy.

Tuber treatment: Tubers are dipped in solution of Copper Oxichloride (2 gm/lit) + Streptocyclin (0.1 gm/lit) for 5 minutes and dry in shade for a day. Then tubers are treated with GA₃ (125ppm) solution to break the dormancy, to avoid flower deformities and for uniform flowering. After drying tubers should be planted within 24 hours.

Planting method: Generally planting is done at the depth of 10cm. Shallow planting is not recommended as the roots can start developing on the top of the tubers. The soil can be covered with wood shavings to ensure minimum fluctuation in temperature.

Approximate planting densities for following sizes are;

Irrigation: The laterals are laid in between two rows of tubers. Drippers of 1.3lph discharge are kept at an interval of 20cm.

Layout

 

During the initial stage zantedeschia needs little quantity of water. Generally watering is done early in the morning. When leaves are unfolded and bed is covered with foliage then water is given by drip system. Daily water requirement is 3 to 5 lit/m2/day depending on climate and soil type. Avoid moisture fluctuation in bed because it favors root rot & other fungal diseases.

Frequent weeding should be done by hand as roots emerge out from soil two weeks after planting.

06.  Fertigation:

Nutritional Composition for the Zantedeschia –

 

Main Elements			Trace Elements
Nutritional Requirement	mmol/lit	ppm (mg/lit)	Nutritional Requirement	µmol/lit	ppm (mg/lit)
NH4+	—		Fe++	25.0	1.4
K	1.3	50.7	Mn++	2.0	0.11
Ca++	1.5	60	B	30.0	0.33
Mg++	1.0	24	Zn++	3.0	0.20
NO3ˉ	3.0	155	Cu++	1.0	0.063
SO4ˉ	1.5	144	Mo	0.5	0.05
Pˉ	0.3	14.55

Standard Fertilizer solution for the Zantedeschia: (Concentration 100 times in 1000 lit. water)

A-Tank solution

Sr. No.	Nutrient
1	Calcium Nitrate	35.4 Kg
2	Fe-EDTA	1.0 Kg

B-Tank solution

Sr. No.	Nutrient
1	Potassium Nitrate (KNO3)	8.7Kg
2	Mono Potassium Phosphate (0:52:34)	4.0 Kg
3	Magnesium Sulphate (MgSO4)	24.6Kg
4	Borax	285 gm
5	Zinc Sulphate	86 gm
6	Copper Sulphate	23 gm
7	Manganese Sulphate	34 gm
8	Sodium molybdate	12 gm

Standard PH & EC of fertilizer solution should be 6.5 and 1, respectively

 

07. Harvesting and packing: Flowering generally starts 90 to 100 days after planting. The tuber that has stored for longer time will flower faster. The flowers are ready for harvesting when their stamens are visible. Generally flowers are harvested early in morning or in evening, when temperature is not too high. Harvesting can be done either by cutting or pulling. But pulling results in greater stem length and works more quickly than cutting and prevents splitting in the While pulling stems are pulled at the base and not at the middle, this prevents stem from becoming weak. Avoid damage to adventitious bud, so pull stem gently and carefully. Flowers are then brought to cold storage at 10oC.

After harvesting, flowers are graded and kept in a preservative solution (Sodium hypochlorite 7 to 10ml/lit). This will reduce stem splitting and damage from post harvest diseases. Flower stem length is 30 to 70cm. Prepare bunches of 10 flowers. These flowers are kept in corrugated boxes of 80x30x12cm length. 40 to 50 Flowers are packed in one box. Boxes must have holes for aeration.

08. Yield: Besides the variety and the size of the tubers flower production depends upon age of the plant material, it’s virus free state, applied preparation techniques, GA treatment, light intensity, humidity of soil and care taken during harvesting. Generally 3 to 4 flowers per tuber can be expected.

09. Tuber harvesting: Before tuber harvesting irrigation is stopped for one month. During this period plants slowly become yellowish and finally become dry. Crop life cycle is of 5 to 6 months and crop senescence starts from six months onwards. After plant senescence begins (Visible with the onset of yellow and decaying leaves), lifting of the tubers can be done by hand Proper care should be taken while digging as young tubers can get damaged. It is also important that not to harvest tubers prior to senescence. During senescence, tuberization (replication of new tubers) is completed and surface of the tubers becomes tougher.

10. Tuber storage: Collected tubers are kept at 20oC with good air circulation. Tubers are spread over mesh in single layer for 25 to 30 days. During this period tubers will get dried and skin gets hardened. Further the temperature is reduced to 15oC and then finally 9oC with relative humidity at 75 to 80 per cent. In cold storage these can stored for 90 days with good air ventilation. Tubers can be used for next production cycle after 90 to 100 days of dormancy period.

11. Diseases: The root system must be able to develop properly. If the root zone is water logged, there is greater risk of damage from Pythium, Rhizoctonia and Phytophthora. Since Erwinia is secondary disease that caused by these primary fungal diseases, they must be

• Pythium: often appears on certain spots and damage the root system of The consequence is that during warm weather, the parts of the plant above the ground start to curl up. Compare to other plants, affected plants shows slower growth.

Control measures:

• Drenching with Aliette (2g/lit), Topsin-M (2g/lit), Benlate (2g/lit), Captaf (2g/lit)
• Rhizoctonia: appears on the border between air and ground. Once the first symptoms of drooping stems are observed, remove the plant carefully from the ground. If stems appear slimmy or rotten above the tuber and in the ground, this indicates Rhizoctonia

Control measures:

• Use pathogen free planting material
• Apply Rhidomil or Benomil (2g/lit) as a soil drenching.
• Alternaria: Manifests itself above ground as a black spot on the leaf. This fungus primarily appears during damp

Control measures:

• Spray with Dithane-M—45 (2.5g/lit)
• Viruses: Following viruses can infect
• Cucumber mosaic virus (CMV)
• Dieffenbachia mosaic virus (DMV)
• Tomato spotted wilt virus (TSWV)
• Potyvirus (Potato virus X)

Control measures:

• Control vectors such as aphids, thrips and mites
• Infected plants must be uproot and destroy

1. Erwinia spp: is the most important bacterial disease observed in call lily damaging the crop on large scale. The symptom of infection can vary from a stem coming loose from the plant to the total collapse of the plan, with foul odour at the bottom of the It is important to find out causes of infection. The bacteria attack particularly when the plants are stressed.

Causes of infection

• Damage due to primary fungus in the
• Too much or too little
• Too high EC
• Damaged due to
• Badly ventilated poly house with high relative

Control measures:

• Remove infected tubers and destroy carefully. Spray with Streptomycin (0.1g/lit)
• Drench with Copper oxicloride (5g/lit)

7. Insect-Pest:

• Aphids: Aphids are dangerous for spreading viruses and colonial aphids for destroying the
• Symptoms:     Shiny    gloss    on    the    plant     with possible black fungus.
• Mites: On the old, brown parts of the bulbs they can appear. When there are many, they also can damage or even completely take away the new shoot of the
• Symptoms: Soft brown part on the bulbs. With bare eye the mites are hard to detect. You need a microscope to be sure.
• Thrips: Mostly during flowering they appear in the flower. Sucking damage can appear in the
• Symptoms:  0.5cm lighter circles  with  black  points  in   the middle in the flowers.