Pre-nursery growth of oil palm (Elaeis guineensis Jacq.) in the various proportions of top soil and manure as planting media

The oil palm pre-nursery stage is an important stage to determine the quality of the seedlings and affect the productivity of fresh fruit bunches. The combination of topsoil and manure as a prenursery medium is expected to provide optimum conditions for the initial growth of oil palm seedlings. The purpose of this study was to obtain the best proportion of topsoil and manure as a pre-nursery medium for oil palm. The research was carried out at the Oil Palm Nursery Center, State Polytechnic of Lampung from April to August 2023. The research was carried out using a Randomized Block Design. There are five levels of treatment, topsoil with no manure (M0), topsoil and manure in a ratio of 1:1 (M1), topsoil and manure in a ratio of 1:2 (M2), topsoil and manure in a ratio of 1:3 (M3) and topsoil and manure in a ratio of 1:4 (M4). The average was tested by the Least Significant Difference (LSD) test at the significant level of 5%. The research showed that the combination of top soil and manure in planting media in a ratio of 1:4 provide the best pre-nursery oil palm seedling growth. The combination of top soil and manure in a ratio of 1:4 produce the highest plant height, largest stem diameter and highest number of leaves in pre-nursery seedlings. However, the composition of the planting media in the form of topsoil and manure did not affect the germination percentage of oil palm seeds.