Germination responses of Moringa oleifera seeds treated with two scarification methods

The effect of soaking in drinking water for 24 h (RA) and fissuring of the seed coat (FT) was tested on the germination percentages of six-month-old Moringa oleifera seeds and on the development of seedlings at the nursery stage. A non-scarification treatment (C) was used as control. For each treatment, 10 styrofoam trays with 77 wells were planted. The percentage of germination was measured from day 3 to 15 after sowing. The following were measured on ten seedlings of each tray: height, stem basal diameter and number of branches, every five days from day 16 post-sowing for 25 days. The data were analyzed by ANOVA for repeated measures in time by GLM, and Tukey means test p < 0.05. The methods did not affect germination, and it was 80, 78.4 and 73.5 % for RA, C and FT The height of seedlings treated with RA was higher than FT and C with values of 19.07, 16.44 and 15.62 cm. No effect was observed on stem diameter and number of branches and presented values of 1.7, 1.7 and 1.8 mm, and 4.84, 4.9 and 5.0 mm for C, FT and RA, respectively. The two physical methods of scarification employed do not improve the seed germination of M. oleifera of six months old, but they improve significantly the development of the seedlings obtained from these seeds in the first days of nursery stage.