Effect of Ascorbic Acid and Zinc on the Productivity of Sunflower (Helianthus annuus L.) under Saline Stress Conditions

Document Type : Original Article

Author

Plant Production Department, Ecology and Dryland Agriculture Division, Desert Research Center, Cairo, Egypt

Abstract

SALTINESS is the most restricting factor for agriculture in arid and semi-arid regions, addition to zinc is deposited in forms not accessible to plants in calcareous soils. During the 2018 and 2019 seasons, two field experiments were conducted at the Desert Research Center, Agriculture Experimental Station at Ras-Sudr, South Sinai Governorate, Egypt. The impact of seed priming by soaking seeds in ascorbic acid at 0, 100, 200, and 300mg ASC/L and the soil application of zinc at the rates of 0, 3, 6, 12, and 24kg zinc sulfate/ha (ZnSO4) on sunflower yields and its attributes were studied. The results reported that plant height, head diameter, number of seeds/head, seed weight/head, seed index, biological, seed and oil yields, and seed oil content responded considerably to ascorbic acid (ASC) in both seasons. In this connection, sunflower seeds soaked in 200mg ASC/L was the potency practice compared to other treatments in both years. ZnSO4 significantly affected all the aforementioned traits in both seasons. In this regard, adding 12kg ZnSO4 ha-1 gave the highest values for all the studied parameters, except for plant height, which recorded the highest value of 143.2 and 131.2 cm at 24kg ZnSO4 ha-1, respectively as compared to non-ZnSO4 application in both seasons. The outcomes of this study suggest that soaking sunflower seeds in 200mg/L ASC alongside ZnSO4 fertilization at a rate of 12kg/ha could be used to alleviate the harmful effects of salinity stress and increase the sunflower yields.

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