Studies on Seed Dormancy Breaking in Cucumber (Cucumis sativus L.) Variety Poinsett

Experiments were carried out to study the effect of chemicals in breaking the dormancy of cucumber. The study was conducted at the Department of Vegetable Science, Horticultural College and Research Institute, Coimbatore during 2017-2018. The seeds of cucumber variety Poinsett were treated with various chemicals immediately after harvest to standardize the best dormancy breaking treatment. The design of the experiment was Factorial Randomised Block Design with two replications. The seeds were treated with the chemicals for 12 hrs and 24 hours duration. The germination test was conducted. Observations on seed and seedling quality parameters viz., speed of germination, and germination percent, vigor index I and vigor index II were recorded. At 12 hours duration, the highest speed of germination (23.29) was recorded in T2 (GA3150 ppm) whereas the highest germination percentage (92) was recorded in T8 (Ethrel150 ppm). At 24 hours duration, the highest speed of germination (30.77) and the highest germination percentage (86) was observed in T12 (KNO3500 ppm). At 12 hours duration, the highest Vigor Index I (2800.16) was recorded in T9 (Ethrel 500 ppm) while the vigor Index II was the highest (12.19) in T8 (Ethrel150 ppm). At 24 hours duration, the highest Vigor Index I (2349.28) was observed in T10 (Ethrel 1000 ppm) while the vigor Index II was the highest (14.066) in T11 (KNO3150 ppm).