THE EFFECT OF USING VERMICOMPOST FERTILIZER AND VERTICAL CULTIVATION ON THE YIELD OF TWO VARIETIES OF TOMATO SOLANUM LYCOPERSICUM MILL

An experiment was conducted at the research station of the Department of Horticulture and Garden Engineering - College of Agriculture - University of Tikrit to study the use of organic fertilization with vermicompost and the vertical cultivation of tomato. In our experiment, we included three types of fertilization (Vermicompost, NPK and comparison) and two methods of cultivation (vertical and regular) on two varieties of tomato (Newton and DOUNA). The experiment was carried out according to a randomized complete block design (RCBD) with a split –spit-plot system with three replications. The averages were compared using Duncan's test at 5% level.

The results showed the superiority of fertilization treatments in improving the yield, especially chemical fertilization (NPK), in all the studied yield characteristics, which did not differ significantly from fertilizing with vermicompost. Regular cultivation also outperformed with an increase in total yield by 139.21%. The results also showed that the Newton variety outperformed the number of fruits by an increase of 16.40%, while the lowest variety outperformed the average fruit weight with an increase of 32.79%.

The triple overlap between the treatments exceeding the chemical fertilization with the usual cultivation of the DOUNA type in the total yield characteristic, with an increase of 54.83% over the comparison treatment, and in the harvest index by 27.00%, and the same variety and breeding with organic fertilization surpassed the quality of the average fruit weight with an increase of 67.86%, and in the early yield by 26.78%.