Evaluation of the efficiency of some medicinal plant extracts on germination indicators and seedling vigor of some vegetable plants

Abstract

This research was carried out in the laboratories of Dept. of Horticulture and Landscape design/ College of Agriculture and Marie Fisker Institute for bioenergy, Thi Qar University to consider the effect of some medicinal plant extracts in improving germination and seedlings growth for some vegetable crops numbers from Solanaceae family. The experiment included soaking tomato (Solanum lycopersicum L.), pepper (Capsicum annuum L.), and eggplant (Solanum melongena L.) seeds in plant extracts prepared from cumin (Cuminum cyminum L.), citronella (Hibiscus sabdariffa L.), moringa (Moringa oleifera L.), and fenugreek (Trigonella foenum-graecum L.) at a concentration of 5% (w/v), in addition to a control treatment of soaking in distilled water.

The experiment was laid out in CRD with three replicates per crop. The results indicated that immersion with plant extracts had a positive effect on the physiological traits of germination, resulting in significant increase in percentage and rate of germination, root length and shoot length compared to the control treatment. The potential utility of the moringa and cumin extracts as natural stimulants to enhance seed viability and vegetable seedling growth was evidenced by their superiority in most of the traits investigated.