Effect of different treatments on seeds survival and growth of Ziziphus spina -Christi seedlings

The considerable role of Ziziphus spina christi in preserving water and soil and its resistance to heat and drought, the necessity of planting this species for afforestation and restoration of their habitats and urban green space is obvious. The aim of this study was to determine the best irrigation and seedbed treatments before planting for Ziziphus spina Christi seedling production. This study was done in Masjedsoleiman nursery as factorial experimental design with three treatments i.e. scratching the seeds in three levels, the planting bed in four levels, and irrigation in three levels as unbalanced completely random design. The result of analysis of variance showed that the main effects of all treatments (planting bed, method of irrigation and scratching) and their interaction effects on viability percentage were significant (p < 0.01). In different methods of scratching, the seeds soaked about 48 hours in water, six hours in acid had the most, and the least survival rate, 48.24% and 4.26%, respectively. Also for traits including the survival percentage, length of the stem, length of the root, the dried weight of stem and proportion of dried weight of stem to the dried weight of root, the semi heavy soil with the average of 54.81%, 17.4 cm, 16.96 cm, 0.148 g and 1.45, respectively was the best cultivation bed. The results showed the planted seeds with every day watering had the most amount of survival (48.29%) and the length of the stem (13.6 cm). The dried weight of the stem was 0.109 g and the dried weight of the root was 0.93 g with every day watering. The rate of plant growth was higher and the function of the plants in sense of weight was influenced. Also the treatment combinations of heavy soil in every day watering in soaking seeds for 48 hours and the heavy soil with every day watering in 2 hours seed soaking acid, had the least survival percentage with 60% and 1.11%, respectively. Reduction in soil heaviness led to lower seed survival rate. The correlation coefficients of collar diameter with dried weight of the root (0.83), stem length with dried weight of the stem (0.85), root (0.85) and dried weight stem with root (86%) were positive and significant (P < 0.1). The survival percentage showed no significant correlation with seedling reproductive traits. The results showed viability and the weights of 1000 seeds had proper conditions for germination and shooting. The different scratching ways with softening the seeds hard cover was easier and led to increasing the germination.