Influence of seed size and salt stress on seed germination and seedling growth of wheat (Triticum aestivum)

Abstract

Wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) is the second most important cereal crop in India after rice. In the present study, response of wheat variety PBW-154 against three size classes and six salinity levels was assessed at germination and early seedling stages. For this, seeds of wheat variety PBW 154 were categorized into three size classes (large, medium and small) and kept under six salinity levels ( 0, 2, 4, 6, 8 and 10 g/l NaCl). Salinity stress registered the highest detrimental effects on germination percentage of medium sized seed class (83.3%), whereas small size seed class (91.7 %) experienced least ill-effects on germination percentage. The shoot length, root length and total dry weight were significantly influenced by the salinity stress. The maximum shoot length (18 cm) and root length (15.7 cm) were measured for large seed size class at controlled conditions. In general, most of the measured traits showed a significant decline at higher salinity levels suggesting that the most stress tolerant and stress avoider seed size can be explored and economically implicated in farmers' fields.

Keywords

• Early seedling growth
• Salinity stress
• Seed germination
• Seed size
• Triticum aestivum