Seed priming durations and concentrations influence on germination and seedling growth of bitter gourd

Abstract

Bitter Gourd (Momordica charantia L.) is one of the most important seasonal summer vegetable crop cultivated extensively in tropical and sub-tropical parts of the country and is believed to have been originated in India. Bitter gourd is very bitter in taste due to the presence of cucurbitacin. The crop requires warm and hot climate for its optimum growth, hence in colder region, poor and slow seedling emergence is always a problem. Another reason for poor germination is its thick seed coat enclosing embryo, which affect germination by imposing mechanical restriction on embryo growth. To overcome these problems, various pre-sowing seed treatments can be practiced (Muhammad et al. 2014, Wang et al. 2002) such as seed priming (Pandita and Nagarajan 2004). Priming as described by Bradford (1986) is a pre sowing seed treatment where soaking followed by partial dehydration triggers the germination process but prevents radicle emergence. After priming, the seeds are dried back to enable normal handling, storage and planting. The objective of this technology is to increase the percentage and rate of germination, expand the range of temperature over which the seed will germinate and increase the uniformity of stand establishment. Priming has proven success ful in enhancing seed performance for a number of crops including vegetables. But before priming any crop seeds, the knowledge of safe limits of priming duration and concentrations is very important to get maximum benefit of priming. Hence, the present research work was conducted in order to study the effect of hydropriming, GA3 priming and PEG 6000 priming with different concentrations and durations on germination and seedling growth of bitter gourd.