Effect of Various Types of Organic Mulch on the Growth of Agarwood (Aquilaria malaccensis Lamk) Seedlings

Agarwood is a plant that does not easily adapt to highly variable environmental conditions.One of the obstacles faced is the problematic planting site.Improvement of planting land can be done by adding organic mulches such as straw organic mulch, sawdust organic mulch, bamboo leaf litter mulch, rice husk mulch.The purpose of this study was to determine the effect of various types of organic mulch on the growth of agarwood seedlings (Aquilaria malaccensis Lamk).This research was conducted for three months from March to June 2023, which took place in the Permanent Nursery of BPDAS Palu-Poso located at Tadulako University, Central Sulawesi.This study used a completely randomised design method with five treatments.Each treatment was repeated 6 times.The observation parameters were seedling height, diameter, number of leaves.The results showed that the provision of organic mulch on agarwood seedlings had a significant effect on the increase in height, diameter and number of leaves of agarwood seedlings.Based on the results of further tests, it shows that the average increase in height, diameter, number of leaves of agarwood seedlings in Treatment M4 (Rice Husk Mulch) gives the best effect on the growth of agarwood seedlings compared to other treatments with an average height increase of 8.50 cm, an increase in the number of leaves with an average of 9.0 strands, with an increase in diameter with an average of 1.43 mm.