Licht en groei: duurzaam sturen met licht II: WP2: Plantvorm ‘sturen’ met het lichtspectrum

In order to decrease the electricity consumption for assimilation lighting it will be important that greenhouse growers replace their traditional HPS lamps by LEDs. In order to make this happen it is important that it is clear which (LED) spectrum allows for growing enough product of good quality. For many ornamental crops, including bedding plants, plant shape is an important quality aspect: the market demands compact-shaped plants. In this project we studied the effects of different (dynamic) light spectra and other climate factors on plant shape and other plant-parameters of several species of bedding plants. Results of the various experiments that were conducted show that the LED light spectrum may be used to ‘steer’ plant shape. However, the results also show that the effect of the light spectrum can depend on the species and other climate factors besides the light spectrum, such as temperature. Results show that it is possible to grow compact-shaped bedding plants using LED lighting, without using chemical growth retardants