Abstract

Leafy vegetables have a high demand for nitrogen availability; however, excessive nitrogen supply causes economic, environmental and agronomic losses, compromising food security. Given the above, the objective was to assess the agronomic responses of arugula that are associated with different nitrogen sources and doses. The experiment was run under greenhouse conditions. A randomized block design was employed; the blocks were arranged in a factorial scheme (2 × 4), using two sources (urea and calcium nitrate) and four nitrogen doses (0, 40, 120 and 360 mg kg-1), with four replications. Thirty-five days after transplanting, the following were assessed: plant height, number of leaves, shoot fresh mass, root fresh mass, shoot dry mass, root dry mass, shoot/root dry matter ratio, leaf area, and leaf nitrogen content. It was found that nitrogen fertilization optimizes crop development and yield. Doses of 100 to 272 kg ha-1 promote increase in plant height and leaf number, respectively. Under the conditions studied, 200 kg ha-1 of N is recommended as a dose of maximum economic efficiency in arugula production. Calcium nitrate is indicated as the best nitrogen source for the production of the crop.

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