Abstract
Salt stress affects plant physiology, development, and growth. This research investigated varied salinity levels on growth traits and ions accumulation of four zoysiagrasses and aimed to identify phenotypic traits associated with variability in salinity tolerance. In this study, “S001” zoysiagrass (Zoysia sinica), “Diamond” zoysiagrass (Zoysia matrella), “J026” zoysiagrass (Zoysia japonica), and “M001” zoysiagrass (Zoysia macrostachya) were grown in plastic pots and exposed to 1/2 Hoagland nutrient solution amended with different amounts of NaCl for 120 days. At the end of the experiment, growth traits and ion contents were determined. The results showed that the salt-tolerance of four zoysiagrasses ranked as “M001” > “Diamond” > “J026” > “S001” according to percent green leaf canopy area (GLCA) after 120 days of salinity treatment. Although dry leaf weight, leaf length/width, and shoot height were significantly decreased by salinity treatments for all turfgrasses, the salt-tolerant species had a smaller drop. Besides, ions secretion capacity and Na+ concentration in leaf and root increased, but K+ concentration together with leaf and root K+/Na+ ratios decreased with the increasing concentration of the salinity. However, the salt-tolerant species exhibited strong K+ absorption and transportation ability and a high salt secretion capacity. The results indicated that growth traits and ions regulation were related to variability in tolerance of diverse zoysiagrasses to salt stress.
Highlights
Salt stress is considered as one of the environmental stresses affecting plant growth and development in some areas [1–3]
“M001” still maintained 100% green leaf canopy area (GLCA) at the salinity level of as high as 300 mM, but its GLCA percent significantly decreased to 92.67% at 400 mM salinity level
As for “S001,” the GLCA percent decreased gradually as the salinity level increased, it died at the 300 mM salinity level on the 20th day of the experiment, and on the 14th day under 400 mM salinity treatment
Summary
Salt stress is considered as one of the environmental stresses affecting plant growth and development in some areas [1–3]. Salt stress causes plant’s physiological drought, ion toxicity, water and nutrient deficiency, and limits plant growth [4]. During turf establishment and maintenance, the use of saline and non-potable water leads to soil salinization. High salinity content in the soil of coastal regions increases the difficulty of turf establishment and maintenance. Plants are warm-season turfgrasses, which can be used extensively for varied turf establishment. Some zoysiagrasses exhibit strong resistance to salinity [11,12], which are ranked as halophytes, such as Zoysia matrella, Zoysia japonica, and Zoysia macrostachya [13]. These turfgrasses are promising to be used in turf establishment in salinized soil and coastal regions
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