PHYSIOLOGICAL AND AGRONOMICAL CRITERIA FOR SCREENING TOMATO GENOTYPES FOR TOLERANCE TO SALINITY

In this study, six wild relative genotypes (LA1310, LA1579, LA1606, LA2079, LA2081, and LA4133), and three varieties (CLN2498E, CA4, and Arka Meghali) were grown in a clay loamy soil containing 0, 50, 100, and 200mM NaCl i.e. 0.219, 5.45, 10.42, and 20.44 dSm-1 (electrical conductivity) to investigate the effect of salinity on growth parameters: plant height, leaf number, leaf length, chlorophyll content, and chlorophyll fluorescence, yield and yield components: days to flowering, days to fruiting, days to maturity, number of flowers and fruit set from cluster 2 to cluster 6, fruit weight, fruit length, fruit width, and total yield. These four treatments were applied when tomato plants were four weeks old and the experiment was conducted until maturity. The results obtained under continuous salinity could be summarized as follows: chlorophyll fluorescence showed slight increase as salinity increase except with LA1579 where it was significantly different at 200mM of NaCl. Chlorophyll content showed stable values at all salinity levels. The results also showed that as the salinity increased, the amount of above growth parameters and yield and yield components decreased in all the nine lines used. It could be concluded from these findings that the effect of salinity appears to be most pronounced on total yield growing under continuous salinity. However, LA1606, LA1579, and LA4133 genotypes and CLN2498E cultivar showed better tolerance salinity than others.