ABSTRACT
Bananas and plantains (Musa species) are one of the world’s most important food crops. A common limiting factor to large-scale production of bananas and plantains is the difficulty in obtaining planting material, due to poor suckering ability.
The experiment was to evaluate the effect of coconut water on in-vivo macro-propagation of four cultivars of Musa species. The experiment was carried out in the Horticultural Nursery of the Department of Crop Science, Faculty of Agriculture, University of Benin, Benin City, Nigeria. The suckers were washed under running water, scarified to remove apical dominance, treated with a Neem leaf extract and fungicide mixture and left to air-dry for 72hours. The corms were planted in humidity chambers filled with saw dust March 2021. The experiment consisted of four cultivars of Musa species; Hex Ukiwe, FHIA20, BITA3 and FHIA18. The treatment consisted of mature coconut water, immature coconut water and control.
The results indicated that the effect of coconut water was significant in the number of days to first sprout and number of plantlets produced, in which immature coconut water was earliest and also had the highest number. Coconut water is a cheaper alternative to growth regulators and is easily accessible. More research should be carried out on mature and immature coconut water to evaluate their effect on the in-situ and ex-situ in-vivo macro-propagation of various cultivars of Musa species.
