EFFECT OF DIFFERENT PRE-SOWING TREATMENTS ON SEED GERMINATION OF PREMNAINTEGRIFOLIA -A RARE MEDICINAL PLANT*

摘要

Premna integrifolia is a rare medicinal plant which is considered as one of the important folk medicines used since ancient times. It is efficacious in fever, cough, cold and it is considered one of the main ingredients of Dashamula - an important Ayurvedic preparation for cough. An experiment was conducted during July 2008 -May 2009 to standardize its seed propagation techniques with various pre-sowing seed treatments. Different pre-treatments like water soaking, gibberellic acid (GA_3) at 200 ppm,hot water (50°C) and cow dung slurry were tried. The highest germination percentage (59.0) was observed in the seeds pre-treated with GA_3 200 ppm followed by hot water treatment (50.5%), both of which were statistically superior over the control. All other germination parameters like rate of germination, root length, shoot length, vigour index and seedling dry weight were significantly high in GA_3 200 ppm which was found the best treatment followed by cow dung slurry and hot water treatment.