Agronomic and productive behavior of cucarda (Hibiscus sinensis) at three cutting ages at the Mishilí Farm in Santo Domingo de los Tsáchilas.

Abstract

The purpose of this research was to evaluate the agronomic and productive performance of the cucarda (Hibiscus sinensis) at three cutting ages, work carried out at the Mishilí Experimental Farm, belonging to the Tsáchila Technological Institute, where three treatments and seven replications were used, each treatment was determined by the cutting age where 63, 70 and 77 days were applied, the experimental unit had a useful area of 4 m2. The experimental design applied was a DBCA (completely randomized block design), the variables under study were: plant length, leaf length, leaf width, number of leaves, stem diameter, dry matter production and protein. According to the results of the research, it was determined that the best cutting age in agronomic and productive behavior was that of treatment T3 (77 days of cutting age) with the following values: plant length 172 cm, number of leaves 94.14, stem diameter 15.29 mm, leaf width 4.57 cm, leaf length 7.43 cm, leaf diameter 15.29 mm, leaf width 4.57 cm and leaf length 7.43 cm, leaf length 7.43 cm and dry matter production/ha 5.62 T/ha. In relation to the nutritional quality of the forage species studied, the best result was obtained by the T1 treatment (63 days of cutting age) with 15.17 % of crude protein.