GROWTH PERFORMANCES OF CASHEW NUT (Anacamium occidentale L) AND RANAWARA (Accasia auriculata L) UNDER DIFFERENT LEVELS OF SAUNITY

Abstract

There are large extents of salt affected lands in Sri Lanka, which is estimated to be'223,000 hectares or about 3% of land area of the island, mainly in dry zone areas. Thisseverely affect the productivity of the agricultural lands. And selection of salt-toleranttreelcrop species is considered to be one of the alternatives to overcome this problem.

Two separate pot experiments were conducted to study the effect of different salinitylevels on growth performances of cashew nut (Anacardium occidentale L) and Ranawara(Aceasia aurieulata L) at the Faculty of Agriculture, Mapalana. Each tree speciesconsisted of eight treatments, which were differentiated, with different concentrations ofsalinity (i.e. 0, 2, 4, 6, 8, 12, 16, 20mmhos/cm). The experimental design for bothexperiments were Complete Randomized Design (CRD) with 4 replicates. One month oldplants raised in poly bags (10" x-Iz") were used to apply different treatments. 100 ml ofsaline water, which, was prepared by diluting sea water in different treatments wasapplied twice a week. Plant height and the dry matter yield of shoots and roots weremeasured at 3, 6, and 9 weeks after the treatment application

The results revealed that plant height, shoot and root biomass has decreased Significantlywith increasing levels of saline water up to 12mmhoslcm compared to the control wherenormal water (O.13mmhoslcm) is applied in cashew nut. Ranawara seems to be more salttolerant. At the early stage, shoot height. shoot weight and root weight significantlydecreased with increasing level of salinity but at latter stage they were not much affectedwith increasing level of salinity. Therefore Ranawara could be recommended as mediumsalt tolerant tree species while cashew nut is not much tolerant to salinity.