Legume Research

  • Chief EditorJ. S. Sandhu

  • Print ISSN 0250-5371

  • Online ISSN 0976-0571

  • NAAS Rating 6.80

  • SJR 0.391

  • Impact Factor 0.8 (2024)

Frequency :
Monthly (January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November and December)
Indexing Services :
BIOSIS Preview, ISI Citation Index, Biological Abstracts, Elsevier (Scopus and Embase), AGRICOLA, Google Scholar, CrossRef, CAB Abstracting Journals, Chemical Abstracts, Indian Science Abstracts, EBSCO Indexing Services, Index Copernicus
Legume Research, volume 38 issue 1 (february 2015) : 131-136

Effect of physical and chemical treatments on seed dormancy and storability of hedge lucerne [Desmanthus virgatus (L.) Willd.]

S.R. Kavita, Vinod Kumar*, K. Sridhar, B.S. Vyakarnahal, B.C. Chanappagoudar
1Department of Seed Science and Technology, University of Agricultural Sciences, Dharwad - 580 005, Karnataka.
Cite article:- Kavita S.R., Kumar* Vinod, Sridhar K., Vyakarnahal B.S., Chanappagoudar B.C. (2024). Effect of physical and chemical treatments on seed dormancy and storability of hedge lucerne [Desmanthus virgatus (L.) Willd.]. Legume Research. 38(1): 131-136. doi: 10.5958/0976-0571.2015.00022.3.
Hedge lucerne is an important forage legume cultivated in India. One of the major problems associated with this legume is hard seed coat which results in poor stand establishment because of reduced germination and un-uniform seedling emergence. Hence, it is important to overcome seed coat dormancy and improve germination for successful stand establishment. Therefore, a laboratory experiment was initiated to find out the best treatment to overcome seed coat dormancy and to know the storability behaviour of hedge lucerne seeds with different physical (mechanical scarification, hot water, smoke treatment, hot air oven) and chemical treatments (sulphuric acid, sodium hydroxide, polyethylene glycol-6000 and ethrel solutions). The results revealed that treating the seeds with conc. H2SO4 for two minute recorded maximum germination of 60.3% upto 11 months of storage followed by mechanical scarification with sand paper (48.0%). Further the seeds showing maximum germination also recorded the highest vigour index and lowest hard seed percentage. However, the seeds which were treated with hot water showed maximum death of the seeds compared to other treatments.  
  1. Abdul-Baki, A. A. and Anderson, J. D. (1973). Vigour determination of soybean seeds by multiple criteria. Crop Sci., 13: 630-633.
  2. Asci, O., Acar, Z., Ayan, I., Basaran, U. and Hanife, M. (2011). Effect of pretreatments on seed germination rate of red clover (Trifolium pratense L.) populations. African J. Agril. Res., 6(13): 3055-3060.
  3. Bhatt, R. K., Tripathi, R. K., Tiwari, H. S., Rajput, D. S. and Amaresh Chanda. (2008). Effect of dormancy breaking treatments on seed germination of Stylosanthes species. Indian J. of Pl. Physiol, 13(1): 60-65.
  4. Chibani, K., Ali-Rached, S., Job, S., Jullien, M. and Grappm, P. (2006). Proteomic analysis of seed dormancy in Arabidopsis. Pl. Physiol, 142: 1493-1510.
  5. Cook, B. G., Pengelly, B. C., Donnelly, S. D., Eagles, D. A., Franco, M. A., Hanson, J., Mullen B. F., Partridge, I. J., Peters, M. and Schultzekraft. R. (2005). Tropical Forages. CSIRO, DPIF, IAT and ILRI, Brisbane, Australia.
  6. Edgar, M. S. and Roberto, L. C. (2004). Effect of scarification and growing medium on seed germination of Desmanthus bicornotus. Tropical Grasslands, 38: 253–255.
  7. Ersin, C., Nafiz, c., Rustu, H., Suleyman, A., 2009, Breaking seed dormancy of some annual Medicago and Trifolium species by different treatments. Turkish J. Field Crops, 14(2) : 72-78.
  8. Ertan Ates. (2011). Influence of some hard seededness breaking treatments on germination in Persian clover (Trifolium resupinatum sps. Typicum) seeds. Romania Agril. Res., 28: 229-239.
  9. Gutteridge, R. C., 1994, The perennial Sesbania species. In : Gutteridge, R. C. and Shelton, H. M., Ed. Forage Tree Legumes in Tropical Agriculture, Wallingford, UK, CAB International, 49–64.
  10. Hopkinson, J. M. and Paton.,C. J. (1993). Treatment of seca stylo seed to reduce hard seed content. Tropical Grasslands, 27: 327-334.
  11. Paramathma, M., Surendran. C., Vinaya Raj, R. S. and Srimathi, P. (1991). Studies on maximizing germination and vigour in Forage legumes. Range Management and Agroforestry, 12(2): 125-128.
  12. Ramezani., Parsa, S. and Naderi, M. (2010). Effect of physical and chemical treatments on seed germination and dormancy breaking of Prosopis farcta. International Journal of Natural and Engineering Sciences, 4(1): 45-48.
  13. Reshma, C., Srimathi, P. and Parameswari, K. (2009). Influence of Pre-storage treatments on storability of Hedge Lucerne (Desmanthus virgatus) cv. TNDV 1 seeds. Madras Agric. J., 96(1-6): 76-79.
  14. Sarker, P. C., Hossai, S. M .A., Bhuiya, M.S.U.,Salim, M. (2000). Breaking of seed dormancy in Sesbania rostrata. Pakistan Journal of Biological Sciences, 3: 1801.
  15. Sundaraj, N., Nagaraju, S., Venkataram, M. N. and Jagannath, K. (1972). Design and Analysis of Field Experiments, Univ. Agric. Sci., Bangalore.
  16. Tran, V. N. and Cavanagh, A. K. (1984). Structural aspects of dormancy. In: Murray, D.R. (ed.) Seed Physiology. Volume 2. Germination and reserve mobilization. pp. 1–44. (Academic Press: Sydney).
  17. Win Pe., Hill, M. J. and Margot, E. H. (2012). Storage conditions and acid treatment. New Zealand J. Exp. Agric., 3(1): 85-89.

Editorial Board

View all (0)