Research Information System
Asian Journal of Plant Sciences, vol.6, no.2, pp.304-307, 2007 (Scopus)
The present study evaluated the effects of a natural lipid, Lysophosphatidylethanolamine, (L) on the eight-year old loquat (Sayda) orchard located on coastal Mediterranean region in Hatay. The applications were conducted prior to bloom (Treatment I) and the same branches were treated again after two weeks from Treatment I (Treatment I+II) while the control branches were treated with water. After two weeks from the second application, buds were sampled from all experimental units and pollen viability test were conducted by standard methods. Randomly sampled buds from all treatments were kept on a room temperature to obtain pollen for both varieties and treatments. The pollen were germinated on media having various concentration of sucrose (5, 10, 15 and 20%) and incubated at 10, 15 and 20°C. The Petri dishes were placed on -20°C after 3, 6, or 9 h incubation to consecutively determine their germination rates and pollen tube growths under a light microscope. The results clearly demonstrated that L application before bloom significantly improves pollen germination rate and pollen tube growth although it has no effect on pollen viability. Among the incubation treatments, 20°C gave the most favorable results for both pollen germination rate and pollen tube growth. The highest pollen germination rates were recovered from 20% sucrose concentration while the longest pollen tubes were at 15%. The positive effects of L may be very advantageous for loquat growing especially for the early fruit production regions. © 2007 Asian Network for Scientific Information.