THE EFFECT OF SALINITY ON GERMINATION, EMERGENCE, SEED YIELD AND BIOMASS OF BLACK CUMIN

Salinity sensitivity of black cumin (nigella sativa l.) was studiedto determine salinity effects on germination, emergence, biological yield, seedyield and plant height. a set of experiments were conducted under completelyrandomized design in the germinator, greenhouse and field. seeds of black cuminwere grown in a growth chamber irrigated with normal water, electric conductivity(ec) of 0.3 ds m-1 as the control, and treatments amended with nacl to obtain ecfrom 3 to 39 ds m-1. different ec treatments (3–39 ds m-1, 3–15 ds m-1 and 3–9ds m-1) were applied at different phenological stages of germination, emerging andseed setting, respectively. the effect of salinity on seed germination, germinationrate, shoot length, root length, seedling weight, root to shoot ratio and seed vigorwas significant at p < 0.01. the highest germination rate (94.8%) was observed atthe salinity of 3 ds m-1 and no germination was observed at the salinity of36 ds m-1. increase of salinity from 0.3 (control) up to 15 ds m-1 significantly(p < 0.01) influenced the rate and percentage of emergence. the highest germinationpercentage (52.5%) and emergence rate (9.2 seedlings per day) were achieved inthe control treatment. seed yield, biomass and plant height were affectedsignificantly (p < 0.05) by different salinity treatments. the essential oil percentagewas not significantly affected by salinity stress. with an increase in the salinitylevel from 0.3 to 9 ds m-1, the average seed yield and biological yield weredecreased from 105.5 to 40.2 g m-2 and from 550.2 to 268.6 g m-2 respectively.