The Spinach is very important vegetable with high content of chlorophyll.

As an important component of man's food, chlorophyll is very close to the blood haemoglobin, hence, its use in medicine for improving blood count and for regulating liver and brain functions.

Bearing in mind these facts, determination of chlorophyll content in the leaf of different spinach cultivars (Matador, Viroflej and Norvak) was the goal of the present study.

The experiments were conducted over the two growing seasons of 1996 and 1997 in the spring growing cycle on the locality of Belgrade (Radmilovac).

Results indicated that the leaf of the cultivar Matador was the richest in chlorophyll content, with 10.94 mg in 1g of dry leaf. The cultivars Viroflej and Norvak were found to aversely content 9.86 and 9.68 mg chlorophyll per g, respectively.

Considering effect of growing season, spinach was found to have formed somewhat higher amount of chlorophyll in 1997 than in 1996 (the difference of 0.66 mg), which may be attributed to more suitable environmental conditions in 1997, allowing for the spinach highest sensitivity to moisture and light conditions.

All tested cultivars responded differently to the environmental conditions over the production season. Thus, the cultivar Viroflej has showed very variable chlorophyll content. The cultivar Norvak didn't respond to different environmental conditions at all, which reflects its being highly stable in view of this characteristic.

Key words: spinach, cultivar, chlorophyll, content, leaf.