Abstract

Interactive effect of four planting dates viz. 1-September, 1-October, 1-November and 1-December with five promising strawberry cultivars viz. Sweet Charlie, Festival, Camarosa, FA 008 and BARI strawberry-1 were studied under subtropical climatic conditions of Bangladesh during the period of winter 2009-10 and 2010-11. Among the interactions, the cultivar Camarosa planted on 1 September exhibited the tallest plants (35.67 cm) followed by Festival (30.67 cm) planted on same date while plants of BARI Strawberry-1 had the shortest plants (14.67 cm) planted on 1 December. The highest number of leaves plant-1 (55.33) was obtained in Festival followed by Camarosa (52.33) when planted on 1 September, while plants of FA 008 produced lowest (23.00) leaves plant-1 when planted on 1 December. Plants of Festival planted on 1 September exhibited maximum mortality percent (21.33%) followed by Camarosa (20.00%) and Sweet Charlie (19.67%) planted on same date. On the other hand, plants of BARI Strawberry-1 planted on 1 December exhibited only 4% of plant mortality. Among the cultivar studied, Sweet Charlie planted on 1 October produced the highest yield per hectare (16.77 ton), while BARI Strawberry-1 when planted on 01 December planting produced the lowest per hectare (2.247 ton). Total soluble solids (TSS) and ascorbic acid content of fruits were highly influenced by interaction effect of date of planting and cultivar and found that regardless of cultivar, fruits of early planted plants contained more TSS and ascorbic acid than late planted plants.