Evaluation of Dry Nursery Management in Semi-arid and Arid Areas of Daro Labu and Habro Districts, West Hararghe Zone, Oromia, Ethiopia

Abstract

The success of plantation program depends to a great extent on success of nursery. Nursery usually, depending on weather condition and bed type. Beds can be made of three types (raised bed, sunken bed and level bed. To this end, we have been undertaken the experiment on evaluation of dry nursery management at arid and semi-arid areas in Daro Labu and Habro districts in randomized complete block design with six replications (PAs as replication) in 2013/14 and 2014/15 cropping seasons. Coffee (Mehara-1 ) variety was sown as test crop in sunken bed with different treatments (bare root without plastic sheet, bare root with plastic sheet, polythene tube without plastic sheet and  polythene tube with plastic sheet) and normal bed (level bed) as control. Two years data of survival rate, root-shoot ratio, and seedling height and germination percentage were collected and analyzed. The result revealed that there was significant difference (P<0.05) in survival rate during first and second years in which bare root without plastic sheet, polythene tube without plastic sheet and control shown higher performance than bare root with plastic sheet and polythene tube with plastic sheet. Bare root without plastic sheet and polythene tube without plastic sheet offers much promise for nursery management for future use in arid and semi-arid areas of the study areas and similar agro-ecologies.

Keywords: Dry Nursery, Percentage, Survival Rate, Root-shoot ratio