Effect of Pre-storage Seed Treatments on the Storage Potential in Soybean Seed [Glycine max (L.) Merill]

Background: Oilseeds are very sensitive to the adverse environmental conditions. The oil inside the seeds will get oxidized easily and deteriorate the seed health during storage. Diverse environmental conditions such as temperature, pests and diseases, seed oil and moisture content, mechanical damages, storage time and relative humidity of store may affect the viability of seeds. Therefore, the present study aimed to study the effect of pre-storage seed treatments on the storage potential in soybean seed. Methods: The study was carried out during rabi 2020-21 and onwards at the Department of Seed Science and Technology, College of Agriculture, Junagadh Agricultural University, Junagadh. The seeds of two soybean varieties (V1: GJS 3 and V2: JS 335) treated with different pre storage dry dressing seed treatments (S1: Control (untreated seed), S2: Boric acid powder @ 5 g/kg seed, S3: Neem kernel powder @ 5 g/kg seed, S4: Wood ash @ 5 g/kg seed and S5: Calcium hypochlorite @ 5 g/kg seed) were stored after packing in three containers (C1: Aluminium foil bag, C2: Non-wooven cloth bag and C3: Air tight plastic containers). The seeds were evaluated for seed quality parameters viz., seed moisture content (%), germination percentage (%), seedling length (cm), seedling dry weight (mg), seedling vigour index – I and seedling vigour index - II up to eight month of storage at interval of two month after storage following Completely Randomized Design (Factorial) repeated three times. Results: Germination percentage, seedling length, seedling dry weight, seedling vigour index I and seedling vigour index II were decreased with increased in storage period, while seed moisture content was increased with increased in storage period, thus was concluded that the quality of seed degraded in storage condition. In the storage condition, seeds of JS 335 treated with wood ash @ 5 g/kg seed and packed in air tight plastic container recorded the maximum germination percentage and was statistically at par with seeds of JS 335 treated with wood ash @ 5 g/kg seed and packed in aluminium foil bag. Seeds of JS 335 treated with wood ash @ 5 g/kg seed and packed in aluminium foil bag recorded the maximum seedling length, seedling dry weight, seedling vigour index I and seedling vigour index II.