Comparative Quality Analysis of Cucumber Grown Under Polyhouse and in Open Condition

Abstract

Cucumber is one of the important cucurbitaceous vegetable grown in Assam and its neighbouring states. Although a large number of F1 varieties are available in the market, their comparative quality assessment has not been made for their suitability to be grown under polyhouse. So, the present experiment involves cultivation of six different F1 hybrids namely Malini, Don, NS 404, Noori, Alisha and Sedona under polyhouse and in open condition having a wide variation in terms of quality characters. During the experiment, various quality parameters or characters were investigated for each of the genotypes.  All the genotypes had a wide range of variation for most of the characters under investigation. The highest moisture content per fruit under polyhouse condition was observed in genotype Malini (96.75%) while in open condition Noori recorded the highest moisture content. Highly significant differences were also observed with respect to ascorbic acid, TSS, reducing sugar and non reducing sugar for the conditions of cultivation. The highest TSS content (4.06 ºB), highest total sugar 3.46% and reducing sugar 0.58 % was observed in Malini under polyhouse. However, Sedona was found to have highest maximum TSS content (4.22 ºB), total sugar 3.51% and reducing sugar 0.61% in open condition. The ascorbic acid content (6.38 and 6.25) and SOD activity (28.47 and 26.94) expressed as mg 100 g-1 and μ mg-1 protein were observed highest in Alisha under both polyhouse and in open condition, respectively. The result revealed that cucumber cultivated under polyhouse condition significantly differ in various quality aspects than the ones cultivated in open condition and are found to be superior in terms of quality. Thus we may say that growing environment is an important factor that could reflect on the quality characters of the cucumber.