BENEFICIAL EFFECTS OF NOVEL BIOFERTILIZERS FORMULA ON GROWTH AND YIELD COMPONENT OF BARLEY GROWN UNDER WATER STRESS CONDITION
FARID HELLAL *
Plant Nutrition Department, National Research Centre, Dokki, El-Buhouth St., 12622, Cairo, Egypt.
SAIED EL-SAYED
Plant Nutrition Department, National Research Centre, Dokki, El-Buhouth St., 12622, Cairo, Egypt.
ABD EL-NASSER A. KHATTAB
Genetics and Cytology Department, National Research Centre, Dokki, El-Buhouth St., 12622, Cairo, Egypt.
*Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Abstract
Biological fertilization is urgently needed to save the environment and reduce the running costs of crops production, but its effects are often hindered by water stress. Field experiments were conducted during the winter seasons of 2019/2020 in Noubaria station at National Research Centre, Bohira Government, Egypt to evaluate the effect of bio-fertilizers (Blue green BGA-Sp{BGA-Sp}, Growth Promoting Bacteria{GPB12}, and Yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae{Sc}) on the biochemical parameters, growth and yield of North African barley varieties (Giza 125, Tombari, Ksar Megrine, Tamellat) grown under sufficient and deficit irrigation conditions. The results showed significant increases in chlorophyll content of leaf barley varieties due to foliar application of BGA-Sp followed by GPB12 for barley Giza 125 as compare to the other studied varieties. Increase of proline content observed at control and lowest value was recorded by all biofertilizer treatments under sufficient irrigation and GPB12 under stress condition. The water stress increment proline content for all studied barley cultivars. Tombari barley variety was increased reduction of proline content under deficit irrigation condition as compare to sufficient irrigation. Blue green BGA-Sp gave the highest values of plant height and spike length under water stress treatments, while the opposite was true at sufficient irrigation. Maximum values of the grain yield were observed after application of BGA-Sp under both irrigation treatments for all studied barley varieties. It could be ranked in descending order relative to the grain yield values as follow: Tombari>Ksar Megrine>Tamellat> Giza125 under sufficient irrigation and Tombari > Ksar Megrine> Giza> Tamellat under deficit irrigation. It may be concluded that the biological fertilization technique is highly recommended to improve yield and yield attributes of barley under water deficit conditions.
Keywords: Barley, water stress, yield, algae, growth promoting bacteria, yeast