The study of some physiological responses of three Iranian saffron (Crocus sativus L.) landraces to salinity stress

In order to study some physiological responses of saffron under saline conditions, three landraces of saffron which were collected from Gonabad, Ferdows and Torbat-e-Heydarieh were compared under 0, 3, 6, 9 and 12 dS/m electrical conductivity of saline water during two years under a rain shield in pots in a randomized complete block design with three replications at the Research Center of Yazd which three levels of the landraces and five salinity levels were distributed as factorial. After uniform emerging of the buds, NaCl solutions with the above mentioned levels of salinity were used gradually for pots irrigation with 30% leaching fraction in order to control soil water salinity in desired levels. The results showed that with increasing salinity, relative water content 6.26%, dry weight 19.80%, the total number of leaves 17.042%, the dry weight of corm 49.42%, the concentration of sugars in the leaves and corms 43.36 and 23.72% were reduced and corms and leaves ion leakage 34 and 27%, sodium concentration70%, sodium to potassium ratio 66.66% and proline in leaves 2.88 times were increased that in most cases these fluctuations were observed in 3dS/m of irrigation water