TY - JOUR AU - Awotedu, Olamilekan L AU - Ogunbamowo, Paul O AU - Awotedu, Bolajoko F AU - Emmanuel, Ileri-Oluwa B PY - 2018/05/24 Y2 - 2024/03/29 TI - Comparative Growth Response of Three Jatropha Species on Heavy Metal Contaminated Soil JF - International Annals of Science JA - Int. Ann. Sci. VL - 5 IS - 1 SE - Research Article DO - 10.21467/ias.5.1.26-32 UR - https://journals.aijr.org/index.php/ias/article/view/518 SP - 26-32 AB - <p>This study investigated the comparative phytotoxcity effect of heavy metal contamination on <em>Jatropha curcas</em>, <em>Jatropha gossypifolia</em> and <em>Jatropha multifida</em> in contaminated soil from a dump site in Ibadan Nigeria. Seeds of <em>J. curcas, J. gossypifolia </em>and<em> J. multifida</em> were planted in a germination tray and later transplanted into polythene pots filled with 2kg of either control soil or heavy metal contaminated soil, a 3 × 2 factorial experiment laid out in complete randomized design (CRD) replicated four times was adopted; treatments imposed include T1 – <em>J. curcas</em>/Control Soil, T2 – <em>J. gossypifolia</em>/Control Soil, T3 – <em>J. multifida</em>/Control Soil, T4 – <em>J. curcas</em>/Contaminated soil, T5 – <em>J. gossypifolia</em>/Contaminated Soil, and T6 – <em>J. multifida</em>/Contaminated Soil. Weekly variation in growth parameters: the plant height, leave production and stem diameter were measured over the course of 12 weeks. The growth parameters were dependent on a combination of both specie type and level of heavy metal contamination of soil. <em>J. multifida</em> (T3) (36.93cm) performed best, comparable with <em>J. gossypifolia</em> (T2) (34.1cm) after 12 weeks while <em>J. multifida</em> (T6) had the lowest mean plant height (7.23cm) which is not significantly (p&lt;0.05) different from other species on the contaminated soil; for leave production, <em>J. gossypifolia</em> (T2) produced the highest mean number of leaves (9.67) which is comparable with <em>J. multifida</em> (T3) (9.00) and less so with <em>J. curcas</em> (T1) (6.67) with significant leave losses on the contaminated soils after 12 weeks; variation in stem diameter shows that <em>J. curcas</em> (T1) had the highest stem girth (1.96 mm) which is comparable to the value obtained for <em>J. curcas</em> (T4) (1.95mm), while <em>J. multifida</em> (T6) had the lowest stem girth (1.09 mm). <em>J. gossypifolia</em> (T2) and <em>J. multifida</em> (T3) had comparable stem girth of 1.57mm and 1.47mm respectively. Toxicity of heavy metals in the contaminated soil greatly affect the growth parameters of the Jatropha.</p> ER -