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Overcoming dormancy in Desmanthus virgatu seeds for improved viability monitoring protocols of genebank accessions

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Title Overcoming dormancy in Desmanthus virgatu seeds for improved viability monitoring protocols of genebank accessions
 
Creator Olbana, Tamiru
Muchugi, Alice
Woldemariam, Yeshi
Hay, Fiona R.
Ndiwa, Nicholas
Jones, Christopher S.
 
Subject Fabaceae
genebank
hedge lucerne
physical dormancy
scarification
seed longevity
viability
 
Description Desmanthus virgatus is a perennial forage legume used as a livestock feed source. Seeds of this species are physically dormant and thus, propagation is difficult. The dormancy also impacts the routine viability monitoring of genebank accessions. The present study investigated different methods to break dormancy in seeds collected from various locations at different times. The result showed that most pre-treatments significantly increased germination percentage. Accessions treated with concentrated sulphuric acid (25 or 30 minutes) followed by sandpaper scarification showed the highest proportion of normal seedlings (94.6 and 96%). Boiling water (2.3 or 3 minutes) was also effective in all accessions except for accession 331. However, accessions treated with hot water (3, 5 or 8 minutes) had a considerable proportion of hard seeds. The proportion of dead/abnormal seedlings was high in seeds treated with a hot wire in all accessions, ranging from 27.5 (accession 15489) to 75.5% (accession 16). The untreated seeds remained hard at the final germination count. We conclude that it is important to use concentrated sulphuric acid and mechanical scarification with sandpaper to break the dormancy for the species to enhance germination, obtain uniform field stands and make wise decisions during storage.
 
Date 2023-10-16
2023-12-12T08:03:47Z
2023-12-12T08:03:47Z
 
Type Journal Article
 
Identifier Olbana, T., Muchugi, A., Woldemariam, Y., Hay, F.R., Ndiwa, N. and Jones, C.S. 2023. Overcoming dormancy in Desmanthus virgatu seeds for improved viability monitoring protocols of genebank accessions. Seed Science and Technology 51(3):421-434.
1819-5717
https://hdl.handle.net/10568/135256
https://doi.org/10.15258/sst.2023.51.3.12
 
Language en
 
Rights CC-BY-NC-4.0
Open Access
 
Source Seed Science and Technology