Chairatna Nilnond, Prakit Tongkum, Theerapong Jantaraniyom and Theera Eksomtramage

pp. 679 - 689

Abstract

The effect of empty fruit bunches mulching on yield, soil moisture contents, and leaf nutrient contents of oil palm were studied at the Agricultural and Technology College Plantation in Krabi Province in
June, 1994. Five-year-old palms planted on the Tha-Sae soil series (Typic Paleudults; fine loamy mixed), at
the spacing of 8 x 8 x 8 m were used. The study used a randomized complete block design with 3 replications,
with 100 palms/replication. The two treatments per replication, with the plot size 0.32 ha (50 palms) consisted
of two mulching times (twenty months interval) with empty fruit bunches at the rate of 35 ton/rai/time and
non-mulching. The results showed that mulching had an effected on increasing the accumulated fresh fruit bunch (FFB) and number of bunches up to 27 and 14%, respectively, within the 3 years experiment. However, there was no significant effect of mulching and non-mulching on average weight of bunches. The soil
moisture contents at different soil depths in the mulching plots were higher than in the non-mulching plots
for all observation periods. The N and K contents in leaves of the 17^th frond were also increased in the
mulching treatment, which may have resulted from the relatively high soil moisture content of mulching
plots.

Keywords

• oil palm
• empty fruit bunches
• mulching
• FFB yield
• soil moisture
• leaf nutrients