Effect of Seed Priming by Pyridoxine on Biochemical Activity and Germination Indices of Melon Under Drought Stress

This experiment was conducted to study the effect of pyridoxine application on yield of melon (cucumis melon)under drought stress.The experiment was laid out in a complete randomized block design in three replications. The experiment had two factors, that the first factor was the different levels of pyridoxine application that was included (0 % as witness, 0.01%, 0.02 % and 0.03 %) and second factor was Polyethylene glycol(PEG) which used to apply the drought stress that included (0,-4, -6, -8 and-12MPa).Before germinating the seeds were treated by pyridoxine levels (0.01%, 0.02 % and 0.03 %) for 24 hours in the laboratory and after that the treated seeds planted subsequently. Results of variance analysis of data in this investigation showed that effect of different level of pyridoxine was significant at 1 % level on percent of germination, the weight of dry plant, the length of the shoot and the root and the amount of catalase enzyme activity. These results showed that PEG on the percent of germination, the weight of dry plant, the length of the shoot and the root, the amount of catalase enzyme activity on the level of one percent (p > 0/01) have meaningful effects, in other word, the results showed that pretreatment seed by the pyridoxine can help the farmers in setting and producing suitable watermelon plant under drought stress.