Effect of pre-soaking agents on salinity stressed cucumber seedlings

An experiment to study the effect of seed pre-soaking agents on cucumber (cucumis sativus l.) growth under various salinity levels was performed. cucumber cv. summer green seeds were soaked in solutions of distilled water (control),salicylic acid (sa) (10-5 m),benzyl aminopurine (ba) (10-5 m) and potassium nitrate (kno3) (3%) for 6 hours. 14-days old seedlings were then exposed to salinity levels of 0,50 and 100 mm nacl. seeds pre-soaked in sa showed significantly higher shoot fresh weight (5.0 g) and shoot (0.8 g) and root dry weight (0.1 g) under saline conditions. similarly,plants produced from seeds pre-soaked in sa had more shoot (52.2 cm) and root length (15.8 cm) in saline and non-saline conditions compared with other pre-soaking agents. plants procured from seeds pre-soaked in sa also attained more chlorophyll “a” (6.60 mg g-1 dry wt.),chlorophyll “b” (136.52 mg g-1 dry wt.) and total chlorophyll content (143.12 mg g-1 dry wt.) in both saline and non-saline conditions,followed by ba and kno3 pre-soaked seeds. all the three pre-soaking agents were also found helpful in decreasing na+ concentrations and increasing k+ concentrations in cucumber seedlings. on the basis of overall results,it can be concluded that seed pre-soaked with sa and ba has a potential for enhancing salt tolerance in cucumber. © 2018,university of agriculture. all rights reserved.