Effect of Bacterial Pre-Treatment on Plant Growth and Dry Matter Accumulation in Lentil

Abstract

Objective: Microbiological fertilizer usage is an expanding phenomenon in agriculture worldwide due to conformity to sustainable agriculture model. Nitrogen fixing and phosphate solubilizing bacteria species that can live symbiotic or free in soils have been used in both legumes and other crops. This experiment was laid out to investigated the effectiveness of rhizobia and plant growth promoting bacteria (PGPB) inoculation on plant growth and dry matter accumulation in different lentil cultivars. Materials and Methods: The experiment was conducted according to completely randomized factorial design with three replications at growth chamber of Field Crops Department, Siirt University, Siirt. A rhizobia strain, Rhizobium leguminosarum biover. to vicia, and two PGPB strains (TV83D and TV119E) were treated to six lentil cultivars and compared with non-inoculated control plants. Results: Analysis of variance indicated that cultivar, bacterial inoculation and CxB interactions caused statistically significant differences (p<0.01) in all characteristics including total biomass, plant and root length, dry matter accumulation in roots and shoots. According to the results, shoot (plumula) fresh weight, root fresh weight, plant length, root length, shoot dry weight and root dry weight were changed between 0.171-0.311 g, 0.150-0.268 g, 12.2-18.5 cm, 11.3-18.8 cm, 0.0186-0.0303 g and 0.0233-0.0381 g, respectively. Out of lentil cultivars, Seyran-96 and Yerli kırmızı exhibited higher growth performance. The TV83D, capable of high nitrogen fixation, promoted plant growth and dry matter accumulation compared with control and other beneficial microorganisms. Conclusion: Biopriming with nitrogen fixing microorganisms provides to enhance plants during early growing stage, therefore, it might be used as a sustainable strategy in lentil cultivation.