RESPONSE OF CHRYSANTHEMUM TO UNICONAZOLE AND DAMINOZIDE APPLIED AS DIP TO CUTTINGS OR AS FOLIAR SPRAY

Uniconazole and daminozide were used as dip on unrooted cuttings or as foliar spray on pinched Dendranthema grandiflora Tzvelev. 'Dalvina' t o control height. Stem elongation was determined on cuttings dipped in solutions of 0, 1.25, 2.5, 5, or 10 mg/L uniconazole or cuttings were dipped and later treated with foliar sprays in concentrations of 1.25 /5, 1.25/10, 2.5/10, and 5/5 mg/L uniconazole, respectively. Other pla nts were sprayed once or twice with uniconazole at 10 mg/L. Daminozide treatments included a pre-plant dip/foliar spray application of 1000/ 2000 mg/L, respectively, or two foliar sprays of 2,000 mg/L. Uniconazo le dip alone retarded stem elongation linearly up to 8 weeks after pro pagation, 5 weeks after pinching, but was not discernible from the con trol treatment 8 weeks after pinching. Uniconazole at 2.5/10 and 5/5 m g/L as a dip/spray combination resulted in plants 33% shorter than the control at the end of the production. Doubling uniconazole dip or spr ay treatments from 5 to 10 mg/L provided no additional reduction of st em elongation. The single uniconazole spray and both daminozide treatm ents had no effect on final height, although daminozide treatments red uced stem dry weight compared to the control. Stem dry weight was redu ced by uniconazole dip/spray combinations compared to dip treatments a lone. Similarly, inflorescence and root dry weights were also reduced by the highest uniconazole concentrations. Higher concentrations of un iconazole reduced transpiration on a per leaf area basis up to 47% com pared to the control at the end of production. In contrast to previous work, leaf area and leaf thickness increased with some uniconazole tr eatments, while time to anthesis was not affected by any of the treatm ents.