Effects of nitrogen form and rate on nitrate and nitrite content in flue-cured tobacco
Effects of nitrogen form and rate on nitrate nitrogen content in flue-cured tobacco were studied. The results showed that the increasing of NH4/NO3 ratio and the amount of nitrogen fertilizer used with in this experiment, the nitrate content of fresh leaf increased. The nitrate content of fresh leaf was lower than that of cured leaf, and had highly significant positive correlation with the nitrate and nitrite contents of cured leaf. The NH4/NO3 ratio and the amount of nitrogen fertilizer had significant positive correlation with the nitrate nitrogen content in flue-cured leaf, respectively. The change of nitrate content showed the same trend as that of nitrite content among the different leaf positions, but the contents of nitrate and nitrite of cutters were bigger than those of upper leave. In addition, the correlation coefficients of nicotine content and total nitrogen content in cured leaf were highly significant at 1% level with the amount of nitrogen fertilizer, and non-significant at 5% level with the NH4/NO3 ratio,respectively.