Author(s)

Guiping Cheng, Shenggen He, Hongmei Li, Jiping Liu, Xing’an Cheng

Corresponding Author

Shenggen He

Abstract

Experiments were conducted to investigate the effects of hot water treatment (HWT) on cut gerbera flowers. The stem ends were treated with deionized water at 38oC for 10 min or 45oC for 5 min, and placed immediately in deionized water at room temperature (23 ± 2oC). The vase life, water relations, antioxidant enzyme activities, including superoxide dismutase (SOD), catalase (CAT) and peroxidase (POD), and the number of bacteria in vase solution were evaluated. Compared with the controls, the treatments with hot deionized water at 38oC for 10 min and 45oC for 5 min significantly prolonged the vase life of cut gerbera ‘Crossfire’. However, for other three cultivars, only the treatment with 45oC for 5 min markedly improved their vase lives. Furthermore, hot treatment with 38oC water for 10 min resulted in higher water uptake and water balance value in cut gerbera ‘Crossfire’ during late vase life. Moreover, higher activities of SOD, CAT and POD also were observed in cut gerbera ‘Crossfire’ treated with 38oC for 10 min. In addition, the bacteria number of vase solution of hot water-treated gerbera was markedly lower than that of the control after the 7th day of vase period.

Keywords

Hot Water Treatment, Vase Life, Cut Flowers