Assessment of Different Date Palm Based Mixes for Soilless Culture

Abstract

Date palm leaves are huge wastes in the growing regions which are mostly burnt annually. One of the solutions is converting leaves to substrate and using in soilless culture. In this study, 24 different mixes were produced by adding zeolite and vermicompost to the composted date palm substrate. The mixtures were incubated for 2 weeks in 35-40%(w/w) moisture. Their physicochemical properties were measured. To study the mixes, two multivariate methods were applied; Principal Component Analysis (PCA) to determine the factors that affect mixture properties to a large extent and Cluster Analysis (CLA). The clustering was processed based on the factors recognized by the PCA. The CLA was done in several stages and in each stage the furthest mixture from cocopeat was deleted. Date palm substrate was processed by leaf waste composting. Using the CLA, on the basis of the PCA analysis, the most superior mixture was defined as date palm substrate (90%), vermicompost(5%) and zeolite (5%) respectively (P90 V5 Z5 ) with indexes in cation exchange capacity, particle density, total porosity, bulk density, water holding capacity and electrical conductivity in the same cluster as cocopeat.