Effects foliar spraying of abscisic acid and melatonin on morphological characteristics and yields performance Salicornia europaea L. under salinity stress

Iimportance of Salicornia as a halophyte plant is the ability to grow in saline and irrigated areas with unusual and highly saline water. In order to investigate the effect of phytohormones on salinity adjustment on vegetative and physiological traits of Salicornia europaea L., an experiment was conducted in a greenhouse located in Gorgan city. The experiment was conducted as a factorial experiment in a completely randomized design with three replications. The first factor was different salinity levels (0, 400 and 600 mM), the second factor was hormone treatment (without hormone, 50 mM abscisic acid, 50 mM melatonin, and the combined effect of both hormones) on aerial spraying. Interaction of salinity and hormones on shoot height, branch number, shoot and root wet weight, seed weight, spike dry weight, total shoot dry weight of Salicornia at one percent (P <0.01) and shoot height and ion leakage (LE) were significant at the five percent level (P <0.05). The maximum yield, grain weight, spike dry weight and total shoot dry weight were increased by 110 (1.1 fold), 195 (19.5 fold) and 245 (24.5 fold) percent, respectively, in 400 mM salinity and abscisic acid and melatonin, together, were obtained. The most of the studied traits were obtained at 400 mM salinity with the combined effect of abscisic acid and melatonin. in the correlation coefficients, straw fresh weight trait coefficients with straw dry weight and root fresh weight at level one percent (P˂0.01) and number of branches, spike dry weight and grain weight at level five percent (P <0.05). The root fresh weight trait was positively and significantly correlated with number of branches, spike dry weight, grain weight and straw dry weight at level five percent (P <0.05). foliar application of abscisic acid and melatonin can help the plant to tolerate salinity and increase its functional properties (especially melatonin in yield components) will be helpful.