Effects of Polyethylene Bag Sizes on In vivo Propagation of Sugarcane (Saccharum officinarum L.) Planting Materials at Metahara Sugar Estate of Ethiopia

An experiment was conducted at Metahara Sugar Estate of Ethiopia with the aim to evaluate the effects of three different polyethylene bag sizes on the propagation responses of three sugarcane genotypes in a completely randomized design with factorial treatment combination arrangements. Analysis of variance revealed that the interaction effects of polyethylene bag sizes and sugarcane genotypes have significant influence on the number of tillers per shoot, number of ischolar_mains per shoot and average ischolar_main length of the sugarcane genotypes studied. white colored polyethylene bag size with 10 cm diameter and 8 cm height (W108) gave the maximum number of tillers per shoot while white polyethylene bags with 10 cm diameter and 10 cm height (W1010) and black polyethylene bag with 30 cm diameter and 20 cm height (B3020) gave maximum number of ischolar_mains per shoot and maximum average ischolar_main length, respectively, in all the sugarcane genotypes tested. As the number of tillers per shoot is a key response variable in planting material propagation, polyethylene bag size W108 is found to be economical in its volume of planting media consumption and in production of maximum number of tillers per shoot of the three sugarcane genotypes tested.