The pinching and application of long days cultivation are techniques essential to the production of chrysanthemum, however little is known about how these factors affect the quality of the plants. Thus the aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of the date of apical pinching and different light intensities as "night break" in the growth and quality of potted chrysanthemum, cultivar Giovani. The experiment was carried out in a randomized block design with split plots, in which the plots were the light intensities (157.26; 66.46; 18.73; 7.66 and 3.8 lux) using incandescent 100 W lamps, one meter above the pots. The split dates of apical cut were performed 15, 17, 19 and 21 days after staking, (DAE), whereas plants remained under long days until 21 DAE. At the peak of flowering we assessed the plant height, diameter of aboveground part of the plants, number of stems per pot, number of nodes per stem, length of 3rd and 4th internodes, number of inflorescences, dry mass of stem, of leaf, of inflorescence and of total aboveground part. The pinching done at 15 DAE with intensity of 157 lux resulted in greater number and inflorescence mass, greater height, number of nodes and better quality of the plants.
Dendranthema grandiflora; photoperiod; flowering; pinching
