The mulching importance for the quality of the oil-seed pumpkin's fruits

More and more Lithuanian farmers choose organic growing of vegetables. This method reduces the usage of chemicals in agriculture, negative effect on the soil and creates an alternative for a healthy lifestyle. One of the ways to better domesticate soil and to increase crop yield is mulching. Soil mulching reduces the evaporation of moisture, regulates soil temperature, improves its structure and increases organic matter stocks, stimulates biochemical processes, improves plant nutrition. It is important to encourage farmers to cultivate oil-seed pumpkins, because the fruits of this vegetable contain bioactive substances such as vitamin C and carotenoids (B-carotene, lutein). These pumpkins can be used as a food and in medicine, seeds are perfect material for oil production. The fibre of pumpkins have cholesterol-lowering properties. Lithuanian climate is ideal for growing pumpkins, this is why they produce one of the highest yields in comparison with the other vegetables. Pumpkins are rated not only on their nutritional and medicinal properties, but also for the simple production technology. The breeders have already created shrubby type of pumpkin plants. In 2010-2011, in Kaunas district farm, oil seed pumpkins cultivars "Heracles", "Hamlet", "Danaja" were grown for research. The aim of two years' research - to investigate the influence of compost/ organic mulch to the quality of organically grown oil seed pumpkin fruit. Pumpkin seedlings were mulched with 5 and 10 cm thick layer of compost mulch. Standard methods were applied to identify the following: dry matter, soluble dry matter, crude protein, crude fibre, the amount of MAD F, NDF, ADF fibre and crude in the pumpkin flesh. The results have determined that 5 and 10 cm compost mulch layer had a significant effect on the amount of dry matter in the pumpkin fleshVytauto Didžiojo universitetasŽemės ūkio akademij