Spatial arrangements on the yield of tomato plants

Abstract

A field experiment was carried out at Epagri/Experimental Station of Caçador in Santa Catarina State, Brazil during the 1998/99 and 2002/03 seasons to evaluate yield components of tomato plants. Five plant
arrangements were used: 30 and 110; 40 and 100; 50 and 90; 60 and 70; 70 and 70cm (where, the first number indicates the smaller spacing, and the second one the largest spacing between groups of two plants in the row). The spacing between rows was 1m for all treatments. Cultivar Diva was evaluated during the 1998/99 season and
‘Carmen’ during the 2002/03 season. The experiment was designed as randomized blocks with five replications
per treatment. There was no significant statistical effect of plant arrangement on total and commercial yield of fruits, percentage of commercial fruits, average weight of the commercial fruits and number of fruits harvested
per area.