Respuesta de maíz (Zea mays) y cebada (Hordeum vulgare) a la solución nutritiva de steiner para la producción de forraje verde hidropónico

Abstract

Ecuador is a generally agricultural country, where small producers face significant challenges in feeding their animals due to the scarcity of land for livestock farming, climatic discontinuity, high production costs and lack of knowledge of innovative technologies, causing difficulties in animal health and animal reproduction, as well as the economic sustainability of producers. In this context, the present research was proposed, the objective of which was to evaluate the agronomic and nutritional behavior of 2 plant species under the hydroponic green forage production system in interaction with two electrical conductivities of the adjusted Steiner solution, intended for feeding livestock animals. zootechnical interest. This experimental research focuses on the examination of the agronomic behavior of two plant species, corn (Zea mays) (I) and barley (Hordeum vulgare) (II) in response to two levels of electrical conductivities (EC); (1) 0.25 dS, (2) 0.5 dS (3) control of Steiner's universal solution, thus seeking to understand how the variation and concentration of a nutrient solution affects the growth and development of the aforementioned varieties. To carry out the experiment, the forage species were produced at a standardized interval of 15 days after pre-germination of the seeds under a controlled and automated (FVH) system. The experiment revealed significant results: it was observed that corn needed a longer root pre-germination time than barley and that in the case of corn plus the interaction with solution (1) it had a higher protein level, with solution (2) it had greater leaf length and biomass, with treatment (T) it had greater root biomass, on the other hand, barley plus the interaction with the solution (2) had greater length, greater leaf biomass, greater root biomass and greater nutritional quality. The results obtained in this research show that the addition of a nutritional source to the production of (FVH) favors obtaining desirable characteristics in production in this type of systems.