Potential of rosemary leaves and branches to enhance storage life of onion bulbs

ABSTRACT Although its importance as vegetable, a considerable amount of onion bulbs is lost in storage. That's why storage condition is one of the most important issues to maintain post-harvest quality. For this purpose, a factorial experiment based on randomized complete block design with two factors and three replicates was carried out. The factors were storage conditions of onion bulbs with five levels (4oC in the seed storage apparatus, 25 and 30oC without using rosemary leaves and branches in the incubator, and 25 and 30oC using rosemary leaves and branches in the incubator) and storage times with ten levels (10 consecutive weeks). The storage feedbacks of bulbs in terms of the weight loss (WL) and the average bud length (ABL) of bulbs were analyzed. The storage of bulbs at 25oC using rosemary fresh leaves and branches inside each bag of bulbs after 10 weeks resulted in the lowest weight loss and average bud length, and significantly controlled the post-harvest fungal rotting and improved the shelf life of bulbs. The findings of this study indicated the high potential of rosemary fresh leaves and branches, which can be considered as an alternative strategy to control post-harvest fungal rotting and to improve the storage life of bulbs considering its simplicity and efficacy in decreasing the storage cost, the weight loss and sprouting without causing any environmental toxicity.