EVALUATION OF MAIZE GENOTYPES FOR MORPHOLOGICAL TRAITS UNDER SALT STRESS

Maize is a third most important cereal crop that belongs to family poaceae and sensitive to salt stress. Salinity is a serious problem in our world due to poor water management practices. Salt stress affects maize growth and its development. Current research was carried out to observe the effect of different concentrations of NaCl (0, 0.2 mM, 0.4 mM, 0.6 mM, 0.8 mM) on maize growth. Three maize varieties (Neelum, Pak afghoi and White corn) were used for comparison. Three replicates were carried out at a time. Data was collected with the interval of 12 days. Shoot length (cm), Root length (cm) and leaf area(cm2), no. of leaves per plant, no. of roots per plant, fresh root weight (g) and fresh shoot weight (g), dry shoot weight (g), dry root weight (g), root shoot fresh weight ratio and root shoot dry weight ratio were recorded. Data was collected with the interval of 12 days. Analysis of variance (ANOVA) and Tukey’s rang test (p ≤ 0.05) were applied as statistical tool among treatment means. Analysis of variance indicated that there were significant differences among all treatments and maize genotypes used for research evaluation. Tukeys test indicated that Maize growth can affected under very low and very high salt concentration but medium or normal salt concentration (0.6mM NaCl) cannot affect plant growth and development. White corn was more tolerant variety for salt stress. Pak afghoi was less tolerant variety. The higher maize growth under salt stress indicated that the maize genotype White corn have high resistance against salt stress that leads to improve plant growth and development even under salt stress environment.