Rooting Acacia mangium cuttings: effects of age, within-shoot position and auxin treatment.

Abstract

The possibilities of vegetatively propagating Acacia mangium through rooted cuttings were examined, focusing on 3 main factors, viz.: (i) the age of the donor plant, comparing 6-month-old seedlings with 2-month-old sprouts from a mature stump (of a 6-yr-old ortet), (ii) the original within-shoot position of the cutting before collection, and (iii) auxin treatment applied to the cuttings (dipping in Seradix-3 powder - an IBA preparation). These 3 factors were shown to influence greatly the capacity of the cuttings for rooting. The best scores in terms of rooting rates were obtained for the plant material collected from (i) the seedlings, (ii) the upper part of the shoot close to the terminal bud, and (iii) when treated with auxin. The only interaction confirmed by statistical tests was between the age of the donor plant and the auxin treatment, with a greater auxin induced increase of rooting rates for the cuttings from seedlings. The results obtained tend to demonstrate that, although capable of improvement by optimizing the investigated factors, the potential of Acacia mangium to be propagated by rooted cuttings remains rather limited, especially when starting from mature material.