Evaluation of alfalfa recovery after salinity stress

Alfalfa (Medicago sativa) is the most important forage crop which has a good situation for cultivating in saline soils. Four lines named, Golestan (20313), F.A.O (2566), Sistan and Baluchestan and Ahar Hamedani as a tolerant, susceptible, semi tolerant and semi susceptible lines, respectively, were used for evaluation of salinity effects on recovery growth after salinity stress and non stressed conditions. The experiment was conducted in perlyt filled pots in greenhouse which recovered after 5 salinity levels using 3 times replicated experiment in RCBD based factorial design. After second cutting the pots were leached with adequate distilled water and used Hoegland nutrition solution for irrigation. After flowering (third cutting) the height, tiller number per plants, internode number per main stem, leaf dry weight, stem dry weight and shoot dry weight were measured. Recovery after salinity stress showed significant differences in above mentioned characters. Line X Recovery interactions on tiller number per plant, stem dry weight and shoot dry weight were significant at 5% probability. Stem dry weight had the highest correlation to shoot dry weight (R2>0.925). Increasing salinity before second cutting leaded to better recovery and increased higher yield than control plants in all of the lines. F.A.O line (2566) showed the most recovery from stress based on measured characters.