Study on the effect of brassinolide and salicylic acid on vegetative and physiological traits of Aloe maculata All. in different substrates in a pot experiment

•Epi-brassinolide and SA as well as vermicompost has positive effect on Aloe yield.•Choice of substrate type depends on the target of Aloe saponaria cultivation.•The highest anthocyanin was produced in the treatment with “azocompost × 1 ppm epi-brassinolide × 1.5 mM SA”.

The effect of different concentrations of salicylic acid (SA) and epi-brassinolide and different substrates was examined on increasing the yield of Aloe maculata All. and improving its vegetative quality in a factorial study based on a Randomized Complete Block Design with three factors, three replicates and 27 treatments. The first factor (A) was substrate at three levels (a1: garden soil; a2: garden soil + 10% azocompost; a3: garden soil + 20% vermicompost), the second factor (B) was epi-brassinolide at three levels (b1: no brassinolide; b2: 1 mg l−1 brassinolide; b3: 2 mg l−1 brassinolide), and the third factor (C) was SA at three levels (c1: no SA; c2: 0.7 mM SA; c3: 1.5 mM SA). It was found that growth regulators epi-brassinolide and SA as well as substrate containing garden soil and vermicompost had positive effect of yield-related parameters including leaf and root fresh and dry weight and plant biomass. Also, vermicompost-containing substrate affected superoxide dismutase antioxidant enzyme positively. According to the results, it can be concluded that although azocompost-containing substrate was not recognized as to be appropriate for higher yield, it had significant impact on the amount of chlorophyll a and b and total chlorophyll as well as anthocyanin. So, the substrate should be selected on the basis of the cultivation target.