Optimal conditions for hydropriming lucerne seeds

Poor seedling establishment is a major deterrent in adopting direct seeding of luceme because of slow and non-uniform germination in pasture establishment. Seed priming to obtain better crop stands could be an attractive approach. The optimal conditions under which to hydroprime lucerne seeds were developed though a series of experiments. This strategy will cut expenses, and make possible the priming of seeds on a large scale without the need to handle the dispose of large quantities of expensive osmotic solutions. The total water weight required to prime lucerne seeds was 80-120% of original weight of seeds and appropriate duration of water priming was 3-9 days. However, priming effectiveness differed in various combinations of temperature, amount of water added, and duration. A new parameter for assessing the optimal conditions of water priming (OCWP) was the average of germination percentage and germination index. Based on OCWP ranking, the optimal conditions of water priming were 5 degrees C, water added at 90-100% of original seed weight, and 3-5 days duration.