MANILA, Philippines — The Quirino State University (QSU) recently established a clonal nursery facility, funded by the Department of Science and Technology’s Philippine Council for Agriculture, Aquatic and Natural Resources Research and Development.
Spearheaded by QSU professor Edgar Benabise, the project aims to construct and maintain a clonal nursery facility and a hedge garden of selected tree species for clonal propagation activities.
Benabise said the staff were trained on macro-somatic clonal propagation. The team then surveyed, fenced, and mapped the location of the hedge garden.
The project team was able to develop a hardening nursery and hedge garden with seedlings of selected native tree species: bignai, kamagong, bani, bolong-eta, anabiong, and lubeg.
It also collected and sterilized the rooting medium for the first four chambers used in the propagation of cloned cuttings.
The facility was recently visited by the DOST-PCAARD’s forestry and environment research division.
Currently, the project team is still gathering data to determine the best cutting origin that will significantly increase the survival and rooting of various native tree stem cuttings.
The project is on its second year of implementation and is expected to end in September.