PLANT CELL BIOTECHNOLOGY AND MOLECULAR BIOLOGY

Healthy seedlings are preferable by forest growers to ensure successful plantation establishment. In this study, effect of transplanting time of pre-germinated seeds of Prunus arborea was investigated.  Pre-germinated seeds were transplanted at three germinating states. These include (1) at radicle emergence (germinated treatment), (2) at 1-2 cm shoot length (1-2 cm shoot treatment) and (3) at 2-Gemma stage (2-Gemma treatment). These treatments were set up with three replicates consisting 45 transplants while the experiment was laid out in a randomized complete block design. Seedlings survival, plant height, stump diameter and crown diameter were all measured at 3, 6, 9, and 12 months of growth. The results indicated that treatments significantly affected survival rate, plant height, stump diameter, and crown diameter of P. arborea seedlings. At 12 months, highest survival rate (77.8%) was found in 2-Gemma treatment while the lowest (31.9%) was found in the germinated treatment. The highest plant height (56.1 cm) was observed in 2-Gemma treatment while the lowest height (37.5 cm) was found in 1-2 cm shoot treatment. The largest stump diameter (5.8 mm) was found in the germinated treatment while the smallest stump diameter (4.9 mm) was found in 1-2 cm shoot treatment. The largest crown diameter (20.3 cm) was obtained in 2-Gemma treatment while the least crown diameter (12.4 cm) was found in the germinated treatment. Thus, the best time for transplanting P. arborea pre-germinated seeds to pots was at 2-Gemma stage for good seedling production as inferred from this study. Moreover, this should be complemented with 70-75% direct sunlight shading until 4 months of growth and reduced to 50% until 11 months of growth.