ABSTRACT

Salacia chinensis L., commonly known as Ekanayaka or Saptrangi, is a medicinally valuable climbing shrub in the family Celastraceae, known for bioactive compounds like mangiferin and salacinol, derived from its roots. Over-exploitation, unscientific harvesting, habitat destruction, and poor seed germination have led to its threatened status. To address these issues, a study was conducted at the College of Forestry, Sirsi, in 2022-24 to enhance seed propagation and seedling quality.
The seed lot of 100 seeds stored at an ambient room temperature were sown at an interval of 30 days for 3 months. The seeds exhibit mild physical dormancy, which disappears after 60 days of storage, resulting in a germination percentage of 63.33 compared to immediately after collection (41.12 %). The seeds were subjected to various pre-sowing treatments. Among twelve pre-sowing treatments, mechanical scarification followed by soaking seeds in 500 ppm GA3 for 8 hours achieved the highest germination percentage of 91.66, mean daily germination (2.39), peak value (3.21), germination value (7.65), germination rate (1.82), seedling dry weight (140.400 mg), seedling vigour index (2037). The seedlings were subjected to various combination of organic, inorganic and bio-fertilizer. The combination of vermicompost (20 g/seedling) and NPK (5 g/seedling) showed significantly higher plant height (31.09 cm), root length (13.80 cm), leaf count (4.03). This treatment led to 74.16 and 54.16 per cent increase in both total fresh weight and total dry weight over the control. The addition of VAM (10 g/seedling) has also enhanced collar diameter to 2.03 mm.
These results demonstrate that specific pre-sowing treatments and nutrient applications can improve germination, reduce dormancy, and produce high-quality seedlings, which could support conservation efforts and large-scale propagation of Salacia chinensis L.