Canopy growth and productivity of Jatropha genotypes

Abstract

Information of jatropha genotypes yield are scarce, but necessary to promote the crop establishment, so it is very important for the commercial planting of this crop. Thus, this study aimed to evaluate the canopy growth and productivity of three jatropha genotypes. The experimental design was a randomized block, with 15 treatments, three replications and five plants per plot. The jatropha genotypes were selected because they have some special characteristics: (CNPAE-107 – small size, CNPAE-133 – productive and CNPAE-169 – seeds without toxicity) obtained in the Germplasm Bank of Embrapa Agroenergy, Brasília, DF, Brazil. The data were collected for five cycles of production. We evaluated: grain yield; height and canopy volume. Treatments differ in all characteristics. Jatropha grain yield has been growing along the first four years of evaluation, however, in the fifth year production was lower when compared to the fourth year. The most productive genotype was CNPAE-133 (2123.8 Kg ha-1year), followed by CNPAE-107 genotypes (2076.5 Kg ha-1 year) and CNPAE-169 (913 Kg ha-1 year), the highest yields were obtained at 3.7 years.