A., Zakaria

H., Zakaria

Universiti Putra Malaysia Institutional Repository

FOR Category F10900: Agricultural SciencesGRADING OF SHADE TREE SAPLINGS IN THECOMMERCIAL NURSERIESH. Zakaria and A. ZakariaFaculty of ForestryUniversiti Putra Malaysia, 43400 UPM, Serdang, Selangor,MalaysiaKeywords: shade tree species, quality planting mate-rial, sapling grading guideline, and morphologicalcharacteristics, rating scale.IntroductionHigh demand for planting material has resulted in short sup-plies of shade tree species, where poor planting stocks arealso being supplied for landscaping. This situation arises dueto the absence of criteria to isolate the good material from thelesser ones. Nelson (1991) noted that the selection of qualityplanting material for landscape planting is essential for goodgrowth, ease of maintenance, aesthetic, and consumer satis-faction. The grading of good looking tree depends on the up-right trunk formation with a well developed root system andperfect crown, whereas the survivability is closely related totheir toughness or inherent capacity to endure stress (Ware,1994). In addition, the vigour of trees is also related to itssusceptibility to stress conditions and several factors that canpredispose tress to stress (Clark and Matheny, 1994). Thisstudy was conducted to develop criteria for sapling gradingguideline based on vigour, size, and health, and also to cate-gorise the existing stocks in selected commercial nurseriesand in selected new-planted sites in terms of quality.Materials and MethodsEight morphological characteristics of tree species were usedto develop a grading guideline for nursery plants, such as fo-liage condition, foliage density, crown configuration, stemstraightness, stem erectness, stem condition, pest and dis-eases, and visual overall condition. A rating scale was givento the sapling based on the quality of each characteristicranging from 1 to 4 with the larger value corresponding tobetter quality. A certain value was obtained based on the to-tal point given to determine the overall quality, which wasclassified into five classes of I, II, II, IV, and V. Theseclasses were subsequently reduced to 3 grades namely A, B,and C for easy to use in the field. A grade is the best, fol-lowed by the acceptable and rejectable of grades B and C, re-spectively. To achieve such an objective, the rating scale wasalso being used to rate the sapling quality in the nursery andthe field. Three nurseries were chosen with the total numberof 1879 saplings obtained from 17 species. Whereas 388newly planted saplings were observed in the field.Results and DiscussionFrom the total number of 1879 saplings, 814 saplings(43.3%) were rated in the A grade, whilst 582 (30.9%) and483 (25.7%) saplings were rated in grades B and C, respec-tively. In the field study, the A grade consisted of 190 sap-lings (49%), whilst 106 (27.3%) and 92 (27.7%) saplingswere in grades B and C, respectively. From the rating done inthe commercial nurseries, the available saplings were consid-ered of mixed quality. The comparison results showed thatmore trees were graded in better grades compared to visualgrading. which tends to be more strictly by putting more in-dividuals in lower grades.ConclusionsThe nurseries tend to produce and sell low quality saplings tothe customers mostly in form of wholesale. Furthermore, theavailable saplings grown in the landscape were also notproperly cared and maintained. Hopefully, a more systematicand efficient way of assessment could be done based on thisstudy.ReferencesClark. J.R. and Matheny. N.P. 1994. The special needs of trees. p. 17_ 28 in Handbook of Integrated Pest Management for Turf andOrnamentals (Leslie. A. R.. ed.). Lewis Publisher. Boca Raton!Ann Arbor! London/Tokyo. 660 p.Nelson, P.V. 1991. Greenhouse Operation and Management. Pren-tice Hall, Engle wood Cliffs. New Jersey. 612 p.Ware, G.H. 1994. Ecological bases for selecting urban trees. Journalof Arboriculture. 20(2) ; 98-103.Supported by [RPA Grant 01-02-04-0188131

Grading of shade tree saplings in the commercial nurseries

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Grading of shade tree saplings in the commercial nurseries

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