Planting methods effect on Astragalus cyclophyllon establishment

Astragalus cyclophyllon is a perennial herb, a member of the family Papilionaceae, withvegetative form that is palatable for light animals. This experiment was done to investigate the best planting method for establishment of Astragalus cyclophyllon in Shahid Hamzavi station in Semirom. The study was carried out at two experiments. In first experiment, seed dormancy was broken using scarification. The results showed that stratification had the highest effect on seeds germination. In second experiment, seeds were planted based on a randomized complete block design in the spring. The methods of seed planting were pitting, furrow and surface planting.Some characteristics including percentage of plant emergence and number of simple andcompound leaves were measured in the spring. There were significant differences among three methods in view point of understudy characteristics. Maximum percentage of plant emergence was related to pitting planting with 58.2% and minimum one for surface planting with 38.3%.On the basis of these results, pitting method is better than others for establishment of this plant.