Division of Corms for Increasing Planting Material of Gladiolus

Gladiolus is one of the most important bulbous flower crops of high commercial value grown in India and abroad predominantly for cut flower production. Unavailability of sufficient amount of planting material of a desirable cultivar is one of the major limitations of gladiolus cultivation on a commercial scale. Increasing planting material of gladiolus by successful division of corms and further manipulating its growth with the application of plant growth regulators like GA3 can overcome the above limitation to a certain extent. The size of the planting material is another main factor to be taken into account for the production of high quality cut flowers. Therefore, optimum size of cut corm segment should be used for obtaining good vegetative growth and superior quality spikes in gladiolus.