Abstract
For the production of iron-enriched leaf vegetables, increasing the foliar iron content by soaking the roots of leaf vegetables in an ammonium ferric citrate solution, prepared with two levels of pH and iron concentration, was investigated in a climatron (temperature: 27°C; relative humidity : 45-55%; PPFD: 380μmol m-2 s-1) . Injuries appeared on the leaves of garland chrysanthemum (Chrysanthemum coronarium L.) in all the treatments and on the leaves of spinach (Spinacia oleracia L.) when soaked in Fe-100 mg L-1 solution with pH 3 and pH 4 for 24 h. In all leaf vegetables, the foliar Fe content on leaves was higher in the pH 3 treatment than in the pH 4 treatment when soaked in the solution of the same Fe concentration and was higher in the Fe-100 mg L-1 treatment than in the Fe-50 mg L-1 treatment when soaked in the solution of the same pH. The foliar Fe content of leaf onion (Allium fistulosum L.) treated with the Fe-100 mg L-1 solution with pH 3 for 24 h showed its maximum (79.5±9.3 mg kg-1 fresh weight) and was about 8.0 times that of the control. The spinach treated with the Fe-50 mg L-1 solution with pH 3 for 24 h showed the maximum foliar Fe content (102.7±12.5mg kg-1) without damage and its value was about 10.0 times that of thee control.
