THE EFFECT OF FOLIAR ZINC APPLICATIONS ON THE CONTENT OF MICRO NUTRIENTS OF LEAVES AND RESIN YIELD IN MASTIC TREE (Pistacia Lentiscus var. Chia Duham.)

Abstract

Mastic tree (Pistacia lentiscus var. chia Duham.), is a medicinal-aromatic plant which is widely used in different industrial applications due to it’s high volatile oil and resin content. In this research contents of some micro elements in leaves and resin yield of trees at two different phenological stages and four different ZnSO₄ levels were determined in mastic tree which had not fertilization in practice. Results showed that foliar ZnSO₄ applications significantly effected the Zn content of leaves at both stages, Cu and Mn at the 1^st stage, only B content at the 2^nd stage. At the consecutive stages of 50% and 100% leafing, foliar Zn aplication at 0.8% ZnSO₄ level would be proper for Zn contents of leaves and at 0.4% ZnSO₄ level would be proper for mastic resin yield of trees. The effects of zinc applications on resin yields were not significant statistically