Evaluación agronómica de 18 líneas de café en la localidad de la vitu, estado trujillo, Venezuela

with the objective of obtaining highly productive and low bearing varieties of coffee plants well adapted to the agro-ecological conditions of trujillo state in venezuela, the vegetative and productive performance of catimor and sarchimor elite lines were evaluated under low cost agronomic management. the study began during 1998 at the locality of la vitu, trujillo state, at 1100 meters a.s.l. from third year age and during three consecutive years (2001, 2002, and 2003), the cherry bean production by plant was evaluated in 18 lines of the genetic material. during 2001 and 2003 the following vegetative variables were measured: number of primary branches, number and length of production branches, stem diameter, plant height, and compaction degree. the combined analysis showed significant differences in plant production among genotypes, years, and their interaction. differences were also found for all the vegetative variables, which were mainly due to environmental effect (years), and not to genotypes. the b18 6/3 and b4 3/5 lines had the greatest yield (2.85 and 2.63 kg·plant-1) thus surpassing the control 'catuaí rojo' (1.2 kg·plant-1).