Effect of Cultivar, Proline and Field Capacity on Shoot Growth of Wheat Plant .

Abstract

A pot experiment was conducted in a private field located on the main road of Kerbala – Babylon , 10 kms eastern of Kerbala during the season of 2010 -2011 . The aim of this study was to assess the effect of water stress and proline on the shoot growth of four wheat cultivars. The shoot growth parameters were plant height , tillers number , leaves number , flag leaf area , fresh and dry weight of the shoot , absolute growth and relative growth rates . Factorial experiment within completely randomized design with four replicates was applied . The experiment included four wheat cultivars ( ie. Fateh , Adnania , IPA 99 and Sham 6 ) , three concentrations of proline ( ie. 0 , 20 and 40 ) mg . l-1 and three levels of field capacity ( i.e. 25 , 50 and 100% ) . The results could be summarized as follow : The effect of cultivars was significant on the previous mentioned traits ,and proline at 20 mg . l-1 was more effective on all studied parameters compared with other concentrations ( ie. 0 and 40 ) mg . l-1 , and the field capacity of 100% was the best compared with 25% and 50% field capacities . The interaction between cultivars and the proline was significantly effective on the studied parameters where cultivars treated with 20 mg . l-1 proline gave the highest values compared with the control treatment ( ie. 0 mg . l-1 ) , and the interaction between cultivars and the field capacity was also effective on the shoot growth parameters . Cultivars grown with 100% field capacity gave higher values of the shoot growth parameters . On the other hand , those cultivars grown with 25% field capacity gave the lowest values of the previous mentioned parameters , and the interaction between the proline and field capacity was also significant on the studied parameters . The proline at 20 mg . l-1 and 100% field capacity treatment gave the highest values of studied parameters , whereas plants grown with 0 mg .l-1 and 25% field capacity gave the lowest values of root growth parameters .