Germination Enhancement of Palmyra seed (Borassus abellifer L.)

Abstract

The components of the ripe palmyra fruit and seed germination enhancement were studied at the Faculty of Science and Technology, Prince of Songkla University, during June-September 2011. The treatments were fresh, washed and soaked seed for 20 and 30 days. Accumulative germination and cotyledonary petiole’s length were evaluated monthly and up to 3 months. The results showed that fruit’s weight was mostly seed accounting for 46% of the total fruit. The seed germination enhancement by soaking in water for 20 days in the first month gave the highest germination (73%) and exhibited significantly different from other treatments (35-50%). The observation of the second month’s accumulative germination of fresh, washed and soaked seed for 20 days were not significantly different accounting for  79 - 89%. However, there were significantly different when compared to those soaked seed for 30 days (55%). The accumulative germination of the third month had not changed much for all treatments and showed the same statistical as the second month. The cotyledonary petiole’s length of the soaked seed for 20 and 30 days in the first month (15 – 16 cm.) was longer significantly than the fresh and washed seed (8-9 cm.) In the second month, the cotyledonary petiole’s length of the fresh and the washed seed was increased up to 30 – 34 cm. They were significantly longer than the soaked seed for 20 and 30 days (18-20 cm). However, no statistically significant difference was observed in all treatments by the third month.