ARMAZENAMENTO DE SEMENTES DE FLOR-DE-SEDA [Calotropis procera (AITON) W.T. AITON]

Abstract

Calotropis procera (Aiton) W.T. Aiton - Apocynaceae (silk-flower) is an important species for several usages: ornamental, forage, timber, textile and medicine, that justify its study. We investigated the physiological behavior and the vigor of seeds under different storage conditions. There were performed month-ly evaluations of germination, seedling emergence, speed of emergence, seedling length and weight of seedling dry matter, during 180 days. Experimental design was completely randomized with a 6x5x3x2 factorial, using combinations of six storage periods (30, 60, 90, 120, 150 e 180 days), five moisture contents (30, 24, 18, 12 e 7%), three package types (paper bags, plastic bags and PET bottles) and two environmental conditions (chamber: 16 °C a 18 °C and laboratory: 27 °C a 30 °C, both environments with 50±5%) with four replications of 50 seeds. Data were analyzed using analysis of variance using F (p≤ 0.05) test to treatments and Tukey test for averages comparison, with polynomial regression analysis considering the storage periods. There were con-cluded that silk flower seeds presented orthodox physiological behavior; the vigor decreased when stored for 180 days; silk flower seeds with 7% moisture content are preserved efficiently in paper bags and controlled environment for 90 days.