The different concentrations of salt in the irrigation water on the initial development of sugar cane, cultivar SP80-1842, grown in soils with different textural levels were evaluated. The experiment was conducted in a greenhouse of the Agricultural Engineering Department of the Federal University of Lavras, in Lavras, MG. The purpose of the protected environment cultivation was to make the treatments of salt levels in the irrigation water possible, without the interference of rainfalls. The treatments consisted of four levels of salinity of the irrigation water (electric conductivity of (0.10; 2.0; 5.0 and 8.0 dS m-1), and three textural classes of soil e (sandy, medium and clayey), amounting to twelve treatments and characterizing a completely randomized design (CRD), in a 4X3 factorial scheme, with eight replicates. At the biggining and after the experimentation, soils' samples were collected in order to obtaining electric conductivity of the saturated extract, picturing the effect of salinity of the irrigation water on the sorts of soils. On 38 days after planting of the buds, the root and shoot dry matter was obtained and over the experimentation were counted daily the number of buds which sprouted in each pot. Results showed that sugar cane, cultivar SP80-1842, is sensitive to irrigation water salinity, during its initial phase of cultivation. All the vegetative parameters were reduced as the salinity of irrigation water increased. An increase of soil salinity was found after experimentation, with growing levels of slat in the water, redounding to fall in the quoted variables. The highest means of those variables were obtained in the medium textured soil.
Water salinity; sugar cane; irrigation
