The Growth and Chemical Composition of Ficus Sycomorus Plants: Influence of Compost and Endophytic Fungi Application in Sandy Soil

The present work was carried out during 2021 and 2022 seasons at the Agricultural Research Station of Al-Marashda, Qena Governorate, Egypt to study the influence of composted sugarcane straw and endophytic fungi(EF) treatments on the growth parameters and chemical composition of Ficus sycomorus transplants in sandy soil. The field experiment was conducted in completely randomized design (CRD) in six treatments. The different 6 treatments were, sandy soil with 25% decomposed sugarcane straw(v/v), sandy soil with 50% decomposed sugarcane straw(v/v), sandy soil and EF, sandy soil with 25% decomposed sugarcane straw (v/v) and EF, sandy soil with 50% decomposed sugarcane straw (v/v) and EFas well as sandy soil alone. The obtained results evident that planting of F. sycomorus transplants in sandy soil mixed with 50% compost by volume with the addition of Chaetomium globosumas entophytic fungi resulted in the highest values of shoot length, stem diameter and the number of leaves compared to the other treatments in the 1 st and 2 nd seasons. Concerning the effects of the tested treatments on nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium, phenolic and flavonoids contents in leaves, growing transplants with the mixture of 50% compost with the sandy soil(v/v) and EF addition followed by the mixture of 25% compost with sandy soil plus EF addition resulted in the highest values of these components.