Abstract
The steady domestic demand for grafted vegetable seedlings appears to be due to the increasing number of aging farmers, who tend to buy grafted seedlings. In the prosperous horticultural regions of Europe, grafted seedlings have started to be utilized more aggressively as environmental problems have become obvious.
Under these domestic and foreign circumstances, most seedling producers depend on manual seeding by many employed labourers for cucurbitaceous scion and rootstock seeds, especially using elliptical and big seeds as there is not yet a seeder adaptable to those seeds on the market.
For manual seeding, farmers need to put each seed in the right direction in each cell by arranging the longitudinal axis and the germ pore side to prevent mutual shielding of cotyle-dons.
This report introduces the results of a market investigation and the development of a seeder that is adaptable to cucurbitaceous seeds and able to arrange the direction of the longitudinal axis.
