Morphological and genetic studies for some date palm grown in Siwa Oasis

Abstract

The present study was carried out during 2020 and 2021 seasons on date palm (Phoenix dactylifera L.), Seidi and Frehi cultivars, Meghal 1 and Meghal 2 grown in Siwa Oawsis, Marsa Matruh governorate, Egypt. The trees were cultivated at 6 X 6 meters apart and irrigated by flood irrigation. Five date palms/replicates from each one was chosen randomly where the experiment was composed from twenty date palm trees, which were healthy and similar in vigour and size as possible. Vegetative and fruit samples were taken to perform the measurements to define the morphological relation among the date palms. Thirty fruit from each palm/replicate were taken to measure the fruit physical and chemical characteristics, and the obtained data were analysed statistically by using Randomized complete block design (RCBD). The obtained results showed that the vegetative growth features; frond length and spine area distance, leaf area, as well as number of spines did not give enough indicator to distinguish among date palm trees. Moreover, fruiting characteristics like bunch weight, yield in kg, fruit weight, size, length and diameter, and flesh fruit weight showed that there were obvious variations among the understudy date palms. Besides, fruit chemical characteristics such as the percentages of TSS, total sugars, reduced sugars, tannins and fruit acidity showed that Meghal 1 and Meghal 2 are more related to Seidi cultivar than Frehi date palm cultivar in the two seasons. Besides, DNA barcoding also showed that Meghal 1 and Meghal 2 are closer together and to Seidi date palm cultivar than Frehi cultivar.