1. Comparing seedling establishment of six different varieties of kenaf (Hibiscus cannabinus L.) under shelter condition Amir Mahdi Khalatbari 1, Hawa, Z.E. Jaafar, 1 Amir Ali Khalatbari, 1 Mohd. Ridzwan Abd. Halim 1 and Hazandy Abdul Hamid 2 1 Department of Crop Science, Faculty of Agriculture 2 Institute of Tropical Forestry and Forest Products Universiti Putra Malaysia, 43400 Serdang, Selangor Kenaf (Hibiscus cannabinus L., Malvaceae) is a warm season annual fibre crop closely related to cotton (Gossypium hirsutum L., Malvaceae) that can be successfully produced in different areas most importantly producing fibre. There has been an increase in interest in growing kenaf throughout the world for its high biomass yield and the elevated fibre content. Kenaf, a fast growing C3 plant native of tropical Africa, is being investigated as new source of bioenergy as well as an industrial crop and has high potential to be used in Malaysia. Crop productivity and yield can be influenced by many physiological processes and environmental factors. Seedling establishment is one of plant’s growth phases in which some of the factors are precisely influential in final production of growth and development which is known as fibre product (AOSA, 1993). Uniform, healthy plant stand establishment is important to kenaf fiber yield production and harvest efficiency (Webber, C.L. III et al, 2002). INTRODUCTION Results of this study confirmed that six varieties of Kenaf namely: Fuhong (FH991, FH992, FH952), V36, Kohn-Kaen 60 (KK60) and finally TK have different seedling establishment patterns. These six varieties as treatments had significant effects on seedling establishment attributes including shoot height, stem diameter, leaf area meter, CGR (cumulative growth rate) and also root system attributes, These differences could be considered as factors influencing the outcome of their growth and fibre productivity. Varieties FH991 and V36 that showed higher value of shoot height and stem diameter probably have higher fibre content and yield. CONCLUSION ACKNOWLEDGEMENT REFERENCES Association of Official Seed Analysts (AOSA), 1993. Rules for Testing Seeds. J. Seed Tech. 16 (3). AOSA, Las Cruces, NM. Dempsey, J.M. 1975. Kenaf. In: Fiber Crops. The University Presses of Gainesville, Gainesville, FL. 203-302. Hossain, M.D., Hanafi, M.M., Jol H. and Hazandy A.H. 2011. Growth, yield and fiber morphology of kenaf (Hibiscus cannabinus L.) grown on sandy bris soil as influenced by different levels of carbon. AJB Vol. 10(50): 10087-10094. Perry, D.A. 1970. The relation of seed vigour to field establishment of garden pea cultivars. J. Agric. Sci. 74: 343-348. Petrini, C., Bazzocchi, R. and Montalti, P. 1994. Yield potential and adaptation of kenaf (Hibiscus cannabinus) in north-central Italy. Ind. Crops Prod. 3: 11- 15. SAS. 2007. SAS/STAT User’s Guide, Version 9.2. SAS Institute Inc., Cary, NC, USA. Shukor, N.A., Hamzah, M.B., Hazandy, A.H., Salleh, G. and Nasir, M.F. 2009. Growth and Phenology of Kenaf (Hibiscus cannabinus L.) Varieties. Pertanika J. Trop. Agric. Sci. 32(1): 29 – 33. Webber, CL III. and Bledsoe, V.K. 2002. Plant maturity and kenaf yield components. Ind. Crops Prod. 16: 81-88. During experimental period shoot height increased for all varieties. The highest value belonged to FH991 and second value belonged to V36 (74.2 cm and 72 cm respectively) whereas variety TK obtained the lowest average height (55.7 cm) at 4th week of experiment (Table 1). Stem diameter followed similar trend in which this parameter increased during four weeks of seedling establishment. All varieties of FH952, V36 and FH991 gained highest value of stem diameter of 5.53 mm, 5.53 mm and 5.50 mm respectively, thus there was no significant difference between them but variety FH992 had the lowest value of stem diameter (4.5 mm) comparing to other varieties (Table 1). All six varieties showed different values of leaf area meter and leaf number during whole experiment period which means there was significant difference between them. For leaf number varieties FH991, FH992, FH952 and finally V36 had 13 leaves equally, but KK60 had the lowest number of leaves which was 12 (table 1). V36 with leaf area meter of 28 cm² was the highest value followed by FH991 and FH952 (24 cm²) whereas TK attained the lowest leaf area meter of 17.7 cm² in 4th week of this study (Table 1). For CGR, varieties FH991 gained the highest value of 10.20 (gr/week) followed by V36 with the value of 8.43 (gr/week) in fourth week of seedling establishment. The lowest value was recorded by variety KK60 of 2.47 (gr/week) (Table 1). Variety TK had the highest value for root parameters such as root average diameter (0.95 mm), root surface area (161.58 cm²) and root volume (3.95 cm³), but it was variety FH991 that had the highest value for root length (591.63 cm) (Table 2). Root shoot ratio tended to decrease from first week until second week then increased during third and fourth week for all varieties mostly. At fourth week of growth, it was found that varieties FH991 and TK had the highest value (0.26 and 0.25 respectively) but V36 was the weakest variety in term of root shoot ratio value (0.12) (Table 2). Table 1 plant growth parameters of six Kenaf (Hibiscus cannabinus L.) varieties Values with the same letter(s) are not significantly different at P<0.05 Table 2 root analysis parameters of six Kenaf (Hibiscus cannabinus L.) varieties Values with the same letter(s) are not significantly different at P<0.05 RESULTS AND CONCLUSION MATERIALS AND METHODS The authors gratefully acknowledge Assoc. Prof. Dr Hawa Z.E. Jaafar for her kind support and contribution. The experiment was conducted at greenhouse in Taman Pertanian University (TPU), Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM). The experimental site was at latitude of N 02°59’, longitude E 101°43’ and altitude of 64 m above the sea level. The microclimate of the glasshouse was set at average temperatures of 28°C (min: 23°C, max: 35°C), Relative humidity of 80-90% and the photosynthetic active radiation (PAR) of 700 to 800 µmol/m²/sec. six kenaf varieties namely Fuhong (FH991, FH992, FH952), V36, Kohn-Kaen60 (KK60) and TK were selected as treatment variables for this experiment. Seeds were obtained from, Institute of Tropical Forestry and Forest products. Data were analysed based on simple ANOVA, using SAS computer package (SAS Institute Inc., 2007). Plant height and stem diameter were determined on three plants of each variety in each replication. At harvest, plant height was measured using a steel ruler. The height was measured from cotyledon level up to the base. Measurement of collar diameter was made using a digital calliper. Leaf area was measured using the Li-3100 leaf area meter (LiCOR Inc., Lincoln, Nebraska, USA). For root measurements, device named Win RHIZO Pro from regent instrument Inc company was used.