Effect of Inoculation with Arbuscular Mycorrhizal Fungi on Citrus Under Water Stress Conditions

A potted experiment was conducted to study the effects of inoculation with Glomus mosseae(Nicol Gerd) Gerdemann Trappe on growth,photosynthetic pigment and water status of trifoliate orange(Poncirus trifoliata(L.) Raf.) seedlings under 20%,16% and 12% water contents of soil conditions.The results showed that the decreases of arbuscular mycorrhizal colonization companied with the decreases of!water contents of soil.Inoculated treatment,to a degree,increased shoot fresh weight,root fresh weight and plant fresh weight,accelerated the contents of chlorophyll a and total chlorophyll,enhanced leaf relative water content but decreased leaf water saturation deficit under the three soil conditions.Water deficicy of mycorrhizal soils was higher than that of non-mycorrhizal soils.It suggests that colonization by arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi promotes plant growth and improves water status of leaves.